LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

GIF^T    OF" 

Mrs.  SARAH  P.  WALSWORTH. 

Received  October,  1894. 
Accessions  No.^lfr.      Class  No. 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR, 


THE    PATIENCE    OF    HOPE, 

i  volume,  uniform  with  "A  Present  Heaven," 
75  cents. 


In  Press. 

TWO     FEIEND  S. 


TICKNOB  AND    FIELDS,  Boston. 


PRESENT     HEAVEN 


ADDRESSED    TO   A   FRIEND 


BY 


THE  AUTHOR  OF   "THE   PATIENCE  OF  HOPE 


ET    TENEO      ET    TENEOR 


BOSTON 
TICKNOR    AND    FIELDS 

1863 


UNIVERSITY    PRESS: 

WELCH,    BIGELOW,    AND    COMPANY, 

CAMBRIDGE. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 


I.  INTRODUCTION          *        .....        * 

II.  THE  GOSPEL  RECEIVED  PARTIALLY       .        .          32 

III.  THE  GOSPEL  RECEIVED  HISTORICALLY     .        .      57 

IV.  THE  GOSPEL  RECEIVED  PROPHETICALLY       .          99 
V.  THE  GOSPEL  RECEIVED  IMPLICITLY          .        .126 

NOTES    .........        '55 


'Think  not  the  Faith  by  which  the  just  shall  live 
Is  a  dead  creed,  a  map  correct  of  Heaven, 
Far  less  a  feeling  fond  and  fugitive, 

A  thoughtless  gift  withdrawn  as  soon  as  given  ; 
It  is  an  affirmation  and  an  act 
That  bids  eternal  truth  be  present  fact." 

HARTLEY  COLERIDGE. 


INTRODUCTION. 

VERY  man  that  cometh  to  God, 
darkly  as  he  may  feel  after,  and  im 
perfectly  as  he  may  find  Him,  comes 
to  Him  under  the  twofold  conviction 
upon  which  the  Apostle  bases  the  existence  of 
Faith  itself;  he  must  be  persuaded  "that  God 
is,  and  that  He  is  the  rewarder  of  such  as  dili 
gently  seek  Him,"  —  a  testimony  which  the 
Psalmist  confirms  even  in  transposing  it,  when 
he  declares,  "  Verily  there  is  a  reward  for  the 
righteous,  doubtless  there  is  a  God  that  judgeth 
the  earth."  Thus  all  approaches  to  the  Supreme 
Being,  howsoever  warped  by  error  or  super 
stition,  possess  something  of  the  nature  of  true 
religion  (re-allegiance),  because  they  testify  to 
man's  belief  in  a  power  raised  above  humanity, 
yet  still  cognizant  of  its  actions  and  influenced 
by  its  dispositions.  And  while  the  human  spirit 
has  proved  itself  unable  without  supernatural 


2  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

help  to  "  retain  God  "  within  it,  while  it  has  so 
often  lost  the  object  of  faith,  it  has  ever  kept 
within  it  an  instinct,  witnessing  to  its  capacity 
for  access  to  the  Divine,  and  reaching  out  after 
a  bond  that  may  place  it  in  an  assured  mutual 
relation  with  that  to  which  it  aspires.  Natural 
religion,  and  all  that  goes  to  make  it  up,  prayer, 
propitiatory  and  deprecatory  offerings,  a  life  spent 
in  accordance  with  what  is  believed  to  be  the 
Divine  pleasure,  is  the  witness  on  man's  part  to 
his  desire  for  reciprocal  communion  with  that, 
which,  though  unseen,  he  feels  to  be  above, 
around,  within  him.  Revealed  Religion  is  God's 
acknowledgment  of  this  inward  instinct,  to  which 
it  restores  its  true  object,  and  shows  how  that 
object  may  be  alone  apprehended. 

I,  saith  Christ  Jesus,  am  THE  WAY.  Revela 
tion  is  the  coming  forth  of  the  Father  to  meet 
His  Son,  while  He  is  a  great  way  oif;  it  is  as  the 
spirit  of  God  moving  upon  the  darkened  surface 
of  man's  heart  and  intellect,  and  saying,  "  Let 
there  be  light."  For  no  man  hath  yet  by  search 
ing  found  out  God ;  no  wish,  no  yearning  of 
the  human  breast,  however  mighty,  could  have 
brought  down  Christ  from  above  ;  no  effort,  no 
agony  of  the  human  mind  could  (as  some  deem) 
have  raised  Him  up  from  the  depths  of  indi 
vidual  consciousness.  Our  God  is  one  that 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  3 

hidetli  Himself.  The  field  of  grace  is  one  with 
treasure  hid  within  it,  a  treasure  to  which  grace 
itself  must  guide  us,  or  God,  though  indeed 
He  is  not  far  from  any  one  of  us,  is  among 
us  as  One  whom  we  know  not.  We  need  a 
Divine  science ;  a  knowledge,  as  regards  spirit 
ual  things,  to  be  attained  only  by  the  aid  of  an 
Appointed  Interpreter,  Revelation,  standing  be 
tween  the  human  soul  and  God,  just  as  natural 
science  stands  between  man  and  nature,  enabling 
him  to  understand,  to  enjoy,  yea,  to  overcome, 
that  which  without  this  blessed  intervention 
would  have  remained  a  barren  mystery. 

Through  Science,  which  is  but,  to  speak 
plainly,  a  familiar  acquaintance  with  the  things 
which  immediately  surround  us,  man,  in  ma 
terial  things,  has  not  so  much  made  as  found 
himself  rich ;  year  after  year  he  goes  on  enrich 
ing  himself  more  amply  with  the  *  blessings  of 
Earth's  breast,  the  fair  and  fruitful  surface,  and 
with  the  blessings  of  her  womb,  the  precious 
things  shut  within  the  ancient  mountains,  and 
hidden  within  the  lasting  hills.  And  yet,  while 
the  aspect  of  social  life  is  changed,  and  its  com 
forts  and  resources  increased  a  thousand-fold,  all 
things,  none  the  less,  continue  as,  in  the  words 
of  Scripture,  "  they  have  been  from  the  begin- 

*  Gen.  xlix.  25. 


4  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

ning  "  ;  no  fresh  blood  has  been  poured  within 
our  outward  system,  no  new  energies,  no  super- 
added  forces,  are  at  work  within  it ;  the  secret 
of  the  change  is  a  simple  one,  —  while  Nature 
has  remained  the  same,  man  has  learnt  to  know 
her  better.  Silence  has  been  broken  up,  and 
separation.  He  has  begun  to  question  this  mute 
companion,  dumb,  it  was  supposed,  from  her 
birth,  and  has  received  for  answer  A  WORLD, 
growing  wider  and  richer  with  every  year  that 
rolls. 

And  when  I  consider  this,  and  remember  that 
our  Father,  unlike  the  patriarchal  one,  has  more 
than  one  blessing  for  His  children  ;  when  I  begin 
to  compare  His  two  great  kingdoms  with  each 
other,  and  remember  that  in  each  we  have  a 
goodly  heritage,  in  each  a  Friend,  the  Steward 
and  Dispenser  of  God's  mysteries,  rich  in  knowl 
edge,  in  wisdom,  and  in  counsel,  I  long  that  we, 
and  all  with  whom  we  are  joint  possessors  and 
inheritors,  should  set  ourselves  to  inquire  into 
the  secrets  of  grace  as  diligently  as  our  age  is 
penetrating  into  those  of  nature.  These,  it  is 
true,  are  not  to  be  won,  like  material  acquisitions, 
by  mere  effort  and  labor,  yet  it  was  a  wise  man 
who  told  us,  that  "  labor  was  profitable  for  all 
things."  And  in  this  great  spiritual  aim,  the 
work,  as  the  Apostle  emphatically  expresses  it, 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  5 

of  our  salvation,  I  often  think  we  lose  much,  by- 
pursuing  it  after  vague  and  fanciful  processes  of 
our  own  devising,  rather  than  by  a  diligent  ap 
plication  of  the  method  provided  for  us  by  God 
Himself.  Like  professed  treasure-seekers,  we 
search  about  under  the  guidance  of  some  dream 
or  impulse,  instead  of  seeking  for  our  wealth 
where  God  has  placed  it,  in  the  natural  riches  of 
the  soil.  And  in  this  region  it  is  our  own  fault  if 
we  proceed  uncertainly.  God  has  been  pleased 
to  leave  us,  as  it  were,  to  guess  at"  the  economy 
of  His  outward  Providence  ;  through  patient  in 
vestigation,  experiment,  and  inference,  we  have 
to  wring  out  Nature's  secrets  from  her  apparently- 
reluctant  grasp,  but  it  is  far  otherwise  with  His 
revealed  economy  of  grace.  Here  we  are  no 
longer  workers  in  the  dark,  who  must  compare 
and  question,  examining  every  step  as  we  go 
along,  and  asking  of  it  with  anxiety,  "  Whither 
will  this  conduct  us  ?  " 

The  very  idea  of  a  Revelation  precludes,  on 
the  part  of  those  who  accept  it  as  such,  the 
possibility  of  uncertainty  or  hesitation  ;  for  if  we 
believe  the  Gospel  to  be  indeed  from  God,  we 
find  all  that  it  demands  of  us,  whether  by  way 
of  fact  or  precept,  lying  within  the  compass  of 
two  grand  yet  simple  words,  —  Acceptance  and 
Obedience.  We  must  accept  the  Gospel,  inas- 


6  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

much  as  it  makes  us  aware  of  all  that  the 
Almighty  is  to  us  ;  we  must  obey  it,  inasmuch 
as  it  declares  to  us  all  that  He  would  have  us  to 
be  to  Him. 

This  seems  a  very  simple,  even  obvious  posi 
tion,  but  if  granted,  it  leads  on  to  a  question  of 
vital  interest.  Is  the  Gospel  of  Redemption 
thus  accepted  among  us,  not  simply  believed  as 
a  fact,  but  believed  in  as  a  POWER,  an  efficacy,  a 
virtue?  received  not  merely  as  a  standard  for 
doctrine  and  a  rule  of  conduct,  but  as  that  which 
it  declares  itself  to  be,  a  principle  having  "  life 
in  itself,"  and  the  ability  to  impart  the  life  which 
it  possesses  ?  Let  us  a  little  consider  the  Gospel 
under  what  may  be  termed  its  sacramental  char 
acter,  as  being  the  means  by  which  the  life  that 
is  in  Christ  is  conveyed  within  the  soul.  To 
the  faithful  receiver  the  outward  letter  of  Scrip 
ture  is  but  the  sheath  or  vehicle  of  the  incor 
ruptible  "  WORD,"  by  which,  as  the  Apostle  tes 
tifies,*  we  are  born  again  unto  God.  To  receive 
it,  therefore,  simply  as  a  revelation  of  God's  will, 
a  record  of  His  dealings,  a  book  of  laws  and 
statutes  and  commands,  is  much  the  same  thing 
as  if,  living  in  the  days  when  He  of  whom  it 
testifies  dwelt  among  us  in  the  flesh,  we  had 
received  Him  as  Moses  or  Elias,  or  as  one  of  the 

*  1  Peter  i.  23. 


A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN.  7 

prophets,  a  Teacher  sent  from  God  to  declare 
unto  men  His  will.  The  reception  which  en 
dues  "  with  power  to  become  the  sons  of  God," 
is  that  which  recognizes  a  higher  mission,  which 
is  ahle  to  discern  that  the  Gospel  of  Salvation, 
in  placing  the  human  soul  in  union  with  its 
Maker  and  Redeemer  and  Sanctifier,  supplies 
in  this  union  the  spring  of  action,  while  it  pro 
claims,  as  did  the  Law,  its  appointed  rule.  What 
we  need  here  is  a  wise  simplicity,  a  childlike 
literal  spirit,  loving  and  bold  enough  to  take 
God  at  His  own  word,  and  to  appropriate  Him 
in  all  for  which  that  word  is  our  warrant ;  but 
instead  of  lifting  up  our  gates,  and  setting  the 
doors  of  our  souls  more  wide  that  this  King  of 
Glory  may  come  in,  instead  of  expanding  to 
meet  the  breadth  and  fulness  of  the  Gospel,  we 
show  a  disposition  rather  to  contract  it  to  fit  our 
own  narrow  standard.  Then,*  because  we  bring 
no  more  vessels  to  hold  it,  the  oil  of  Divine 
grace  is  stayed.  But  we  seem  in  general  so 
little  conscious  of  this,  our  imperfect  reception 
of  the  truths  upon  which  our  salvation  rests, 
that,  even  in  most  deeply  deploring  our  defi 
ciencies  towards  God,  we  fail  to  appreciate  their 
true  origin,  and  make  a  subject  of  regretful 
wonder  of  what  a  more  correct  estimate  of  our 

*  St.  Augustine. 


8  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

revealed  relations  with  the  Almighty  would 
place  in  the  light  of  a  simple  necessity.  We 
urge  this  question  upon  others  in  the  way  of 
remonstrance,  upon  ourselves  in  the  way  of  self- 
condemnation  ;  the  preacher  asks  of  his  people, 
the  Christian  of  his  heart,  Why  does  the  gen 
eral  standard  of  our  practice  fall  so  far  below 
the  mark  of  our  high  calling,  as  set  before  us 
in  Scripture  ? 

And  to  this  there  conies  one  answer,  sorrow 
ful  and  self-upbraiding,  —  "  We  fail  because  we 
do  not  obey  the  Gospel";  while  there  remains 
a  far  truer,  far  deeper  witness  and  accusation 
written  up  against  us,  —  0  that  we  could  see 
how  plainly !  — "  We  fail  because  we  do  not 
believe  it."  "I  believed,"  said  the  Psalmist, 
"and  therefore  have  I  spoken";  because  we 
believe,  and  according  to  the  measure,  strength, 
and  fulness  of  our  belief,  will  we,  as  Christians, 
speak  and  act  and  live.  As  "  the  stream  can 
ascend  no  higher  than  its  fountain,"  so  it  is  in 
vain  to  try  to  live  up  to  the  Gospel  until  we 
(to  speak  familiarly)  believe  up  to  it.  And  this 
brings  me  to  the  question  I  have  been  so  long 
anxious  to  consider,  Do  we  —  I  speak  of  those 
who  are  Christians  in  more  than  in  name  and 
outward  profession  —  so  believe  it  ?  Do  we 
even  know  enough  of  its  Divine  nature  and 


A  PRESENT  HEA  YEN.  9 

efficacy  to  see  that  each  one  of  the  complaints 
so  commonly  heard  among  us,  whether  of  pov 
erty,  of  weakness,  of  incapacity  to  serve  and 
love  our  Father  who  is  in  Heaven,  is  at  the 
same  time  a  confession  of  unbelief  in  that  Gos 
pel  in  which  God  has  been  pleased  to  make 
Himself  our  own  ?  For  in  the  things  which 
concern  salvation,  to  believe  is  to  "have.  Faith 
is  not  only  a  spiritual  insight,  but  a  realizing 
appropriating  faculty,  through  which  God,  and 
with  Him,  in  the  words  of  the  Apostle,  "  all 
things,  become  ours";  for  all  that  God  is  in 
Himself,  righteousness  and  wisdom  and  strength, 
He  becomes  unto  us  through  Faith.  Accept 
ance  of  the  Gospel,  that  is,  of  the  exceeding 
great  and  precious  promises  through  which  we 
become  partakers  of  the  Divine  Nature,  places 
us  in  direct  union  with  God,  —  the  strength, 
fulness,  and  intimacy  of  this  union  is  maintained 
by  faith,  and  must  exist  in  exact  proportion  to 
its  measure ;  and  thus,  in  the  words  of  Scrip 
ture,  all  things  become  possible  to  those  that 
believe,  through  the  power  of  Him  to  whom 
belief  unites  them.  Yet  that  we  have  still 
much  to  learn  in  this  matter  is  betrayed  by 
another  sentiment,  often  heard  among  us  under 
variously  modified  forms  of  expression.  "  Why," 
it  is  asked,  "  so  much  anxiety  about  points  of 


10  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

doctrine,  when  it  is  the  devotion  of  the  heart 
and  the  practice  of  the  life  upon  which  God 
has  made  salvation  to  depend  ?  It  is  these 
which  constitute  the  Christian." 

"  The  tree  is  known  by  its  fruits " ;  most 
truly  so,  —  but  it  depends  for  the  maintenance 
of  those  fruits,  yea,  even  for  its  own  existence, 
upon  its*  root  in  the  soil  beneath.  The  Chris 
tian  life  is  judged  of  (and  this  with  the  strictest 
propriety)  by  that  part  of  it  which  is  seen,  but 
it  depends  upon  the  part  of  it  which  is  unseen 
for  the  hold  which  it  takes  and  keeps  upon 
God  ;  and  to  look  for  works,  or  the  blossoming 
and  expansion  of  God  within  the  life,  without 
Faith,  by  means  of  which  the  soul  is  rooted  and 
grounded  in  Him,  is  as  little  rational,  that  is,  as 
little  in  accordance  with  things  in  their  true 
relation  to  each  other,  as  it  would  be  to  look 
in  any  simply  natural  operation  for  an  effect 
detached  from  its  producing  cause.  Faith  is 

*  It  is  interesting,  by  way  of  illustration,  to  compare  what 
Lord  Bacon  tells  us  of  natural  growth,  "  that  every  vegetable 
swells  and  throws  out  its  constituent  parts  towards  the  circum 
ference,  both  upwards  and  downwards,  and  there  is  no  difference 
between  the  roots  and  branches,  except  that  the  root  is  buried 
in  the  earth,  and  the  branches  are  exposed  to  the  air  and  sun," 
(Novum  Organum,  book  ii.,)  with  what  Baxter  says  of  progress 
in  spiritual  life,  "  I  know  that  every  man  must  grow  as  trees  do, 
downwards  and  upwards  at  once,  and  that  the  roots  increase  as  the 
bulk  and  branches  do." 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  11 

the  Law,  upon  whose  actuating  energy  God 
has  made  the  life  which  we  have  in  Him  to 
depend  ;  and  we  can  no  more  detach  what  we 
do  in  our  lives  from  what  we  are  in  our  souls, 
than  we  can  separate  heat  or  light  from  their 
essential  principles,  or  expect  to  enjoy  either  in 
the  absence  of  the  conditions  in  which  their 
existence  is  involved.  The  disciples  showed 
they  were  aware  of  this  by  that  remarkable 
answer,  when  enjoined  by  their  Master  to  the 
practice  of  forgiveness,  "  Lord,  increase  our 
faith"  ;  we  might  have  expected,  when  a  moral 
duty  difficult  to  the  natural  man  was  in  ques 
tion,  the  words  would  have  been  "increase  our 
charity "  ;  but  in  the  conviction  that  obedience 
was  only  practicable  through  a  strength  and 
virtue  that  did  not  reside  in  themselves,  their 
prayer  was  for  an  increase  of  the  faculty  through 
which  alone  the  Divine  aid  can  be  made  availa 
ble  by  the  soul,  and  effectual  to  the  supplying 
of  all  its  wants.  We  also  confess  that  all  our 
sufficiency  is  of  God,  that  without  Him  it  is 
impossible  to  please  Him.  I  long,  therefore, 
to  see  Christians,  in  a  deep  realization  of  this 
acknowledged  dependence,  begin  to  take  up  the 
Gospel  under  its  true  and  living  aspect,  as  the 
means  whereby  our  Creator  has  been  pleased 
to  impart,  not  advice  and  instruction  only,  but 


12  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

Himself  unto  His  creatures  ;  and  before  we 
can  do  this,  we  have  need  to  look  a  little  more 
closely  into  what  Doddridge  calls  the  God-ward 
side  of  our  covenant. 

I  think  we  lose  much  from  beginning,  as  you 
express  it  in  one  of  your  letters,  our  religion  at 
the  wrong  end,  concerning  ourselves  first,  and 
principally,  with  the  idea  of  what  we  are  or 
ought  to  be  to  God,  without  sufficiently  con 
sidering  the  converse,  what  He  is  to  us.  "  Ac 
quaint  thyself,"  saith  one  of  old,  "  with  God, 
and  be  at  peace "  ;  and  the  Apostle,  speaking 
by  the  same  Spirit,  tells  of  a  Knowledge  through 
which  grace  and  peace  are  multiplied.  Yet  how 
little  careful  are  we  to  attain  to  this  knowledge, 
how  little  zealous  to  advance  in  it,  how  little, 
judging  from  the  modes  in  which  we  are  accus 
tomed  to  express  ourselves,  do  we,  even  in  a 
speculative  sense,  know  about  the  work  of  our 
redemption  and  sanctification,  those  great  things 
which  God  has  done  for  us  already,  wherein  it 
becomes  us  to  rejoice  ! 

How  few  among  us,  with  the  beloved  Apos 
tle*  and  his  faithful  and  accepted  converts,  seem 
to  be  persuaded  of  the  love  and  good-will  that 
God  hath  to  us,  His  children,  reconciled  in 
Christ !  Even  our  best  books  and  preachers 

*  1  John  iv.  16. 


A  PRESENT  HEA  YEN.  13 

dwell  so  little  upon  the  glad  tidings  *  in  their 
fulness,  that  I  feel  justified  in  asserting  that  a 
Christian  speaking  among  Christians  can  scarcely 
employ  the  language  which  Scripture  authorizes 
the  Redeemed  of  the  Lord  to  use,  or  express  an 
interest  in  the  hopes  which  it  has  made  the 
heritage  of  every  sincere  believer,  without  ap 
pearing  to  set  forth  some  strange  thing.  If  he 
should  venture  to  speak  of  a  reconciled  Father, 
a  living  Saviour,  an  actual  Sanctifier,  a  present 
Heaven,  and  to  speak  of  all  these  as  being  his 
own,  it  will  be  at  the  risk  of  being  set  down  by 
his  hearers  as  enthusiastic,  possibly  as  presump 
tuous  ;  and  this,  because  the  grounds  of  his 
confidence  will  be  in  so  far  mistaken  that  he 
will  be  supposed  to  be  resting  upon  some  par 
ticular  claim  to  God's  favor  as  an  individual, 
instead  of  simply  asserting  his  title  to  that  its 
manifest  declaration,  in  which  all  his  brethren 
share.  Yet  he  boasts  of  no  more  direct  assur 
ance  of  pardon  than  that  for  which  Scripture 
gives  him  warrant  in  the  revelation  of  a  Sav 
iour's  death  ;  he  asks  for  no  sign  or  token  of 
personal  acceptance,  having  in  this  matter  no 
other  anxiety  than  to  secure  his  interest  in  the 
already  given  manifestation  of  His  Father's 
love,  the  Christ,  who  is,  if  they  will  so  have  it, 
both  "  His  and  theirs." 

*  Note  A. 


14  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

As  Englishmen  and  Protestants  we  love  our 
Bibles,  we  are  zealous  for  them,  if  not  always 
with  a  zeal  according  to  knowledge,  —  also  jeal 
ous  for  them,  inclined  to  resent  every  attempt 
to  restrict  the  circulation  of  Scripture,  or  to 
explain  away  its  peculiarities  ;  so  that  I  dare 
the  more  strongly  take  up  my  protest  against 
an  unauthorized  yet  generally  current  version, 
passed  about  among  us  from  lip  to  lip,  without 
question  or  challenge,  than  which  I  dare  ven 
ture  to  assert  no  published  version  of  Scripture, 
however  mutilated  and  imperfect,  ever  fell  so 
lamentably  short  of  the  original.  It  is  in  the 
very  nature  of  error  to  be  at  once  vague  and 
subtle  ;  to  insinuate,  and,  as  it  were,  incorporate 
itself  wherever  it  can  find  entrance,  yet  all  the 
while  to  assume  no  tangible  form  wherein  it 
may  be  detected.  Therefore  I  would  that  it 
were  possible  to  arrest,  and,  so  to  speak,  con 
dense  this  pseudo-Gospel ;  to  bid  it  stand  side 
by  side  with  the  true  one,  that  we  may  see 
what  a  shrunken,  diminished  thing  it  looks, 
and  learn  how  far,  in  favor  of  these  cisterns 
of  our  own  which  can  hold  no  water,  we  have 
departed  from  those  living  fountains,  the  lively 
oracles  of  God. 

We  have  fallen,  as  a  people,  into  a  low  and 
limited  view  of  God's  inner  dispensation  of 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  15 

grace,  akin,  little  as  we  may  ourselves  suspect 
it,  to  the  Rationalistic  interpretation  of  His 
outward  polity.  God's  Word  in  the  one  case, 
as  God's  work  in  the  other,  is  toned  down  and 
diluted  until  few  of  its  distinctive  and  essential 
features  remain.  There  is  a  practical  as  well  as 
a  speculative  unbelief,  and  it  is  this  which  we 
have  suffered  to  creep  over  us.  In  ordinary 
society  —  I  speak  boldly,  and  yet  I  hope  with 
out  offence  —  there  are  few  who  deny  the  Gos 
pel  to  be  true,  perhaps  fewer  still  who  believe  it 
to  be  efficient.  To  explain  myself  further, — 
we  confess  the  Gospel  to  be  from  God,  we  give 
in  our  adhesion  to  the  facts  that  it  records,  but 
when  we  come  to  the  effectual  working  of  this 
Gospel,  to  the  actual  living  consequences  of 
those  recorded  facts,  there  is  an  evident  stop 
ping  short,  a  "limiting"  of  God  akin  to  that 
of  the  Israelites,*  and  arising  from  the  self-same 
source,  a  dulness  and  slowness  of  heart  to  be 
lieve  the  great  things  which  He  has  done  for 
our  souls,  and  is  even  now  doing  in  them.  And 
while  I  am  writing  these  words,  slowness  of 
heart,  I  am  reminded  that  it  may  be  advisable  to 
point  out  the  distinction  between  what  I  am 
now  contending  for,  the  simple  recognition  of 
Gospel  truth,  and  its  spiritual  reception,  which 

*  Ps.  Ixxviii.  41. 


16  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

is  in  itself  salvation.  This  last  claims  the  con 
sent  of  the  heart  as  well  as  of  the  intellect,  and, 
like  all  things  born,  brought  up,  and  nourished  * 
there,  it  does  not  develop  its  full  strength  and 
perfection  in  a  moment  ;  we  may  follo\y  our 
Lord  for  years,  and  find,  as  the  disciples  did, 
that  He  has  still  "  many  things  "  left  to  tell  us, 
for  these  things  of  God  are  notf  taken  and 
shown  to  us  by  Him  who  has  received  that 
office,  all  at  once  ;  yea,  even  in  the  end  we 
shall  discover  that  to  understand  this  Gospel  in 
its  breadth  and  depth  and  height  and  fulness, 
is  at  the  same  time  to  appreciate  that  which 
the  Apostle  tells  us  passes  our  present  knowl 
edge, —  the  Love  which  ascended  up  on  high 
and  brought  down  this  gift  for  us  men  that  the 
Lord  our  God  might  dwell  among  us.  To  see 
God  as  He  is,  is  the  satisfying  portion  of  the 
blessed  in  heaven,  and  this,  to  know  Him  as  He 
is,  is  the  privilege  of  the  faithful  upon  earth,  — 
one  to  be  attained  only  through  that  "  unction 
from  the  Holy  One  by  which  we  understand  all 
things,"  —  a  Divine  intuition,  imparted  in  most 
cases  slowly,  and  in  all,  I  think,  gradually. 

Therefore  you  will  perceive  that  what  I  am 
now  saying  to  myself  and  others,  is  not  so  much 
"let  us  know  these  things,"  as  "let  us  learn 

*  Note  B.  t  John  xvi.  15. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  17 

them."  If  we  would  be  "  taught  of  God,"  let 
us  place  ourselves  under  the  tutelage  He  has 
appointed.  The  Spirit  speaks  unto  us  by  the 
Word  ;  faith  comes  by  hearing.  It  is  precisely 
this  hearing,  which,  according  to  what  I  shall 
venture  to  call  a  common-sense  view  of  our 
religion,  I  now  claim  for  the  Gospel.  I  demand 
for  it,  as  I  might  do  in  behalf  of  any  merely 
natural  system,  that  it  should  be  allowed  to 
speak  for  itself,  and  accepted  (if  accepted  at  all) 
as  that  which  it  is  self-declared  to  be.  All  that 
I  would  say  is  this,  if  God  has  spoken  to  man,  it 
must  be  to  some  clear  and  evident  purpose,  and 
in  a  way  to  render  that  purpose  availing.  His 
speaking  must  be,  not  in  word  only,  but  in 
power.  Let  us  see,  then,  that  we  turn  not  in  > 
any  wise  away  from  Him  that  speaketh.  If  this 
message  be  indeed  from  our  Father,  our  part  as 
wise  and  obedient  children  is  a  simple  one,  —  to 
believe  what  He  says,  to  take  what  He  gives,  — 
simple,  but  who  shall  say  that  it  is  easy !  Hard, 
rather,  through  its  very  simplicity,  to  man's 
erring  spirit,  prompt  ever  to  limit,  to  transfer, 
and  modify  the  plainest  statement  of  Scripture, 
eager  to  behold,  eager  even  to  endure,  some 
great  thing,  solicitous  to  ask,  What  shall  we 
do  to  work  the  works  of  God?  forgetful  of 
that  full  and  final  answer,  This  is  the  work 


18  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

of  God,  that  ye  believe  on  Him  whom  He  hath 
sent. 

Yet  except  we  become  as  little  children,  we 
shall  in  no  case  enter  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven, 
and  it  is  in  a  spirit  emulous  of  that  which  in 
childhood  receives  so  much,  because  it  receives  so 
literally,  that  I  would  fain  approach  some  of  the 
traditions  most  generally  received  among  us, 
and  compare  them  with  that  Gospel  of  everlast 
ing  Truth  which,  in  such  measure  as  they  obtain 
ground,  they  go  far  to  render  of  none  effect. 

But  before  I  quit  this  introductory  view  of  my 
subject,  a  sense  of  its  unspeakable  importance 
impels  me  to  linger  yet  awhile  upon  the  thresh 
old,  and  to  repeat  my  intimate  conviction  that 
we  shall  find,  so  we  do  but  pierce  deep  enough, 
that  inward  decay  and  outward  disorder  —  all 
things  which,  whether  in  the  heart  or  in  the 
community,  spring  up  to  trouble  and  defile  — 
hold  by  one  common  root,  —  Unbelief  in  God's 
"Word  and  in  His  Work.  There  is  a  breaking  in 
and  a  going  out  among  us,  only  to  be  remedied 
by  our  taking  up  our  true  position,  —  that  of  a 
people  who  have  the  Lord  for  their  God ;  and 
to  this  end  we  must,  in  the  words  of  the  hun 
dredth  Psalm,  be  sure  that  the  Lord  He  is  God, 
and  be  or  make  ourselves  equally  sure  that 
we  are  the  people  of  His  pasture,  and  the  sheep 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  19 

of  His  hand.  We  must,  now  that  the  Patri 
arch's  dream  has  become  the  Christian's  reality, 
set  our  feet  firmly  upon  this  the  lowest  round 
of  the  golden  ladder  that  reaches  even  unto 
Heaven.  We  must  take  the  first  step,  FIRST. 
There  is  a  significance  in  the  very  placing  of 
these  clauses  of  the  petition  our  Lord  left  us, 
"  Thy  kingdom  come ;  Thy  will  be  done." 
God's  kingdom  must  be  established  within  the 
soul  before  His  Will  can  be  fulfilled  in  the  life ; 
and  it  is  from  our  imperfect  realization  of  this 
truth  that  so  many  are  weak  and  sickly  among 
us,  and  so  many  sleep  the  sleep  of  Formalism, 
that  brother  of  spiritual  Death,  from  which  it  is 
scarcely  to  be  distinguished.  We  mourn  over  a 
Christianity  as  far  degenerated  from  its  primi 
tive  Type,  "  the  tree  planted  by  the  rivers  of 
waters,"  as  if  it  had  been  (as  in  Chinese  gar 
dening)  dwarfed  and  dwindled  of  set  purpose, 
without  seeming  aware  of  the  presence  of  the 
cold  underlying  subsoil  through  which  this  result 
has  been  effected.  Yet  to  lament  over  defi 
ciency  and  decay  is  at  the  same  time  to  ac 
knowledge  that  such  is  in  great  part  voluntary ; 
it  is  to  confess  that  we  have  cut  ourselves  off 
from  Him,  the  source  and  spring  of  life  and 
fulness,  who  has  provided  for  the  abundant  * 
watering  of  His  garden. 

*  Ecclus.  xxiv.  31. 


20  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

God,  in  revealing  Himself  to  us  in  His  Son, 
in  communicating  Himself  to  us  through  His 
Spirit,  has  placed  us '  in  a  wide  and  wealthy 
place  ;  in  this  land  there  is  no  straitness,  neither 
scarceness ;  here  we  may  eat  bread  and  drink 
water  to  the  full,  and  find  honey  even  in  the 
stony  rock  of  tribulation.  Why  are  we  then  a 
feeble  people,  —  feeble  though  numerous  ?  ready 
to  exclaim,  when  we  read  of  those  who  have 
gone  before  us  in  God's  faith  and  fear,  "  There 
were  giants  in  the  land  in  those  days  "  ;  instead 
of  asking  why  those  days  should  in  any  respect 
be  different  from  these  present  ones,  when  God, 
now  as  then  the  Strength  of  His  people,  remains 
the  same  and  changes  not.  If  He  has  in  any 
degree  ceased  to  work  mighty  works  in  and  for 
us,  must  not  this  cessation  arise  from  that  which 
of  old  restrained  Him  ?  Because  of  unbelief, 
"  He  did  not  there  many  mighty  works  "  ;  nay, 
one  Gospel,  going  further,  emphatically  declares 
that  He  could  not,  "because  of  unbelief."  And 
if  the  arm  of  the  Lord  be  not  more  openly 
revealed  among  us,  may  it  not  be  because  His 
report,  God's  own  report  of  His  own  dealings, 
has  not  been  believed  ?  Instead  of  lamenting 
our  degeneracy  from  God's  saints  and  chosen 
ones  under  either  Covenant,  let  us  rather  ex 
amine  ourselves  to  see  whether  we  are  really  in 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  21 

that  Faith  which  was  once  delivered  to  them, 
and  through  which  they,  out  of  weakness  being 
made  strong,  "  obtained  promises,"  and  wrought 
the  marvels  recorded  of  them.  These  were 
men  of  like  passions  and  infirmities  with  our 
selves,  only  differing  from  us  according  to  the 
measure  and  proportion  of  their  faith.  They 
lived  under  no  clearer  dispensation,  they  en 
joyed  no  fuller  privileges,  than  are  and  must 
remain  our  own,  so  long  as  that  Word  endures, 
"  Lo,  I  am  with  you  alway,  even  unto  the  end 
of  the  world  "  ;  and  there  is,  therefore,  no  need, 
whatever  we  of  ourselves  may  choose  to  im 
agine,  that  we  should  come  behind  them  in  any 
spiritual  grace  or  gift.  To  do  the  first  Works, 
we  have  but  to  return  to  the  first  Love,  we  have 
but  to  seek  the  first  Faith ;  and  to  this  end  we 
must  lay  to  our  souls  this  counsel  given  by  the 
Spirit  to  a  Church  that,  declining  in  belief, 
had  declined  in  strength  and  energy,  "  Re 
member,  therefore,  how  thou  hast  received  and 
heard." 

The  Covenant,  like  the  commandment,  is 
"exceeding  broad";  close  and  intimate,  wide 
and  reaching  even  unto  Heaven,  are  the  rela 
tions  in  which  it  binds  man  with  his  Maker 
and  Redeemer,  yet  it  enters  not  into  man's  un- 
renewed  heart  to  receive  the  things  which  God 


22  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

liath  prepared  for  them  that  love  Him.  So  that 
believers  have  need  to  say  with  Achsa,  "  Thou 
hast  given  me  a  south  land,  give  me  also  springs 
of  water."  God  is  not  the  author  of  confusion, 
yet  over  how  many  of  our  thoughts  about 
Him  —  alike  over  our  ideas  of  what  He  is  to  us, 
and  what  He  would  have  us  be  to  Him  —  does 
confusion  still  reign !  Viewing  the  Gospel  un 
der  its  perceptive  aspect,  our  popular  theory 
appears  to  set  the  character,  which  it  is  its  object 
to  mould,  before  us,  just  as  a  work  of  confess 
edly  unapproachable  excellence  is  placed  before 
a  youthful  artist.  It  is  a  magnificent  outline, 
an  admirable  ideal,  which  our  Master  has  set 
before  us  to  contemplate,  but  the  excellence  of 
which  He  never  expects  us  to  attain.  This, 
indeed,  is  an  acknowledged  impossibility;  we 
must  do  as  well  as  we  can,  but  need  not  even 
aim  at  a  close  resemblance.  So  much  for  our 
work ;  in  that  which  we  are  to  be  towards  God, 
He  does  not,  it  seems,  mean  us  to  be  that  which 
He  tells  us  to  be.  And  even  thus  with  our  Faith ; 
in  that  which  God  is  to  us,  we  are  not  to  ex 
pect  Him  to  be  that  which  He  has  promised  to  be. 
We  are  to  believe  in  the  Promise,  God's  Word, 
otherwise  we  shall  not  be  Christians ;  but  we 
are  not  to  look  for  its  performance,  the  Work 
that  He  doeth  upon  earth,  or  we  shall  be  en- 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  23 

thusiasts,  expecting  what  we  shall  never  meet 
with.  What  does  this  mean  ?  Even  that  we 
think  our  God  to  be  altogether  such  a  one  as  we 
are  ourselves,  —  asking  for  what  He  does  not 
expect  to  receive,  promising  what  He  does  not 
intend  to  bestow ;  yet 

"  His  sorrows  were  in  earnest :  no  vain  proffer 
Thou  madest  there,  no  superficial  offer." 

The  reality  of  what  God  has  done  for  us. 
while  we  were  yet  unreconciled  may  surely  be 
our  warrant  for  the  reality  of  what  He  will  do 
for  us  now  that  reconciliation  has  been  effected. 
The  love  that  was  manifested  in  Him  that  died 
for  our  sins,  is  exerted  in  Him  that  even  now 
liveth  for  our  justification.  Christ  is  the  same, 
whether  His  love  be  shown  in  dying  for  us  or 
in  living  for  us ;  it  is  but  one  Spirit  under  a 
different  administration.  "  Reach  hither,"  then, 
He  may  still  say  to  many  a  cold  and  doubting 
Disciple,  "  thy  finger,  and  behold  my  hands ; 
and  reach  hither  thy  hand,  and  thrust  it  into  my 
side  ;  and  be  not  faithless,  but  believing." 

The  Christian  name  and  profession  is,  to  a 
mere  professor,  something  which  he  carries  about 
with  him,  because  he  does  not  know  what  else 
to  make  of  it.  Perhaps  at  some  future  time  he 
means  to  make  good  these  title-deeds,  to  claim 
the  citizenship  they  confer ;  at  any  rate,  they 


24  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

may  lie  beside  him  dormant.  He  leaves  them 
alone  for  the  present.  But  there  is  many  a 
sincere  Christian  among  us  whose  position  is  far 
more  trying  and  inconsistent,  for  to  him  this 
Holy  Name  and  Profession  is  not  a  change  of 
goodly  raiment,  laid  by  because  unsuited  to  his 
actual  wear :  he  is  bidden  to  the  wedding ;  he 
is  called  to  the  battle ;  he  knows  that  garments 
•are  provided  for  the  guests,  armor  for  the 
soldiers ;  yet  in  this  there  is  less  satisfaction 
than  might  have  been  expected.  He  does  not 
move  about  in  his  new  apparel  with  ease  and 
freedom ;  he  asks  himself  if  it  was  made  for 
him ;  he  knows  that  he  does  not  fill  his  armor ; 
he  will  not  let  go  his  sword,  but  he  does  not 
wield  it  freely;  even  his  wealth  embarrasses 
him;  for  while  he  is  haunted  by  an  uneasy 
consciousness  of  its  responsibilities,  he  is  little 
soothed  by  the  actual  reality  of  its  enjoyment. 
It  is  hard  to  discover  what  degree  of  value 
Christians  attach  to  those  general  privileges  of 
their  position  which  the  Apostles  place  before  us 
in  so  broad  and  diffused  a  light.  What  is  it 
that  we  understand  by  being  "  in  Christ "  ?  and 
in  how  much  are  we  the  gainers  by  being  born 
into  a  world  which  He  died  to  redeem,  and 
being  baptized  into  a  Church  which  He  lives  to 
sanctify  ?  What  precise  benefit  do  we  expect  to 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  25 

receive  from  the  ordinances*  which  God  has 
appointed  for  us  to  walk  in  ?  What  advantage, 
in  short,  is  there  in  being  a  Christian  ?  Is  our 
Lord  to  be  among  us  only  as  a  mighty  man  that 
cannot  save  ?  I  sometimes  suspect  that  much 
of  our  feebleness  of  spirit  may  be  traced  to  a 
secret  reservation  of  the  heart.  We  are  not 
minded  to  serve  God  with  our  whole  hearts, 

*  I  will  particularly  instance  that  of  prayer,  because  it  is  the 
one  in  the  practice  of  which  Christians  are  the  most  constant, 
while  they  appear  the  least  certain  as  to  its  benefits.  On  this 
point  every  shade  of  opinion  seems  to  prevail  among  us;  and 
amongst  these  one  whose  tendency,  seldom  very  clearly  ex 
pressed,  is  to  place  the  advantage  of  prayer  in  the  effect  which 
it  works  upon  our  own  minds,  by  drawing  out  our  souls  to  God, 
and  bringing  them  into  a  devout  recollection  of  His  presence. 
This  benefit,  which  meditation  would  equally  confer,  is  undoubt 
edly  one  of  the  indirect  advantages  of  prayer ;  but  to  place  it  as 
the  prominent  one  is  to  fall  far  short  of  the  Scriptural  idea  of 
that  communion,  through  which  we  make  our  requests  known 
to  the  God  who  tells  that  He  will  both  hear  and  help  those  who 
faithfully  call  upon  Him,  —  the  God  whom  the  Psalmist  thus  ad 
dresses:  "  0  thou  that  hearest  prayer."  To  believe  in  prayer  is, 
in  St.  John's  words,  to  have  a  confidence  that,  if  we  ask  anything 
according  to  His  will,  He  heareth  us,  —  a  confidence  which  cannot 
extend  its  fulness  to  our  petitions  for  such  blessings  as  are  mere 
ly  temporal;  for  in  these  prayers,  sanctioned  as  they  are  by  our 
Heavenly  Father,  we  cannot  be  sure  that  the  things  we  ask  for 
are  According  to  His  will,  which,  in  the  disposition  of  earthly  af 
fairs,  he  has  not  made  known  to  us;  but  we  may  rest  in  this  con 
fidence  most  fully  in  our  requests  for  spiritual  blessings,  for  on 
these  points  God's  will  has  been  revealed;  and  we  know  that,  in 
seeking  and  coveting  all  such  things,  we  are  only  asking  for  what 
He  wishes  to  give  us,  seeking,  not  to  have  our  own  pleasure,  but  to 
do  His.  "  And  this  is  the  Will  of  God,  even  your  sanctification." 
2 


26  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

and  therefore  dare  not  look  to  Him  to  bless  and 
help  us  in  our  whole  lives.  We  seem  to  look 
upon  His  promises  as  things  reserved  either  for 
extraordinary  Christians,  or  for  ordinary  ones, 
perhaps,  upon  extraordinary  occasions,  —  for  sea 
sons  of  imminent  distress  and  difficulty,  —  those 
great  water-floods  in  which  we  all,  as  if  in 
stinctively,  turn  to  God  as  to  a  place  to  flee 
unto.  Yet  show  me  the  Christian  who  believes 
in  and  lives  by  every  word  which  comes  out  of 
the  mouth  of  God,  who  expects  to  be  answered 
in  his  prayers,  to  be  aided  in  his  deeds,  to  be 
strengthened  in  his  conflicts,  by  the  Saviour  in 
whom  his  person  is  accepted ;  who,  in  the  sim 
plest  affair  of  every-day  life,  does  God's  bidding, 
because  in  His  Word  He  has  so  commanded 
it,  and  expects  His  help,  because  in  the  same 
Word  He  has  promised  it ;  and  I  will  show  you 
one,  like  St.  Stephen,  full  of  faith  and  of 
power,  —  a  Christian  man  or  woman,  who,  in 
Christ,  is  and  has  all  things. 

We  have  been  told  by  the  greatest  of  practical 
thinkers,  that  "  it  is  impossible  to  advance  surely 
in  any  course,  where  the  goal  is  not  properly 
fixed."  Until  we  set  a  definite,  and,  I  may  also 
add,  an  attainable  object  before  us,  as  the  end 
to  which  our  endeavors  are  directed,  there  can 
be  no  steady,  satisfactory  progress ;  we  are  but 


A   PRESENT  HEAVEN.  27 

spending  our  strength  in  vain,  and  drawing  our 
bow  at  a  venture.  Now,  I  think,  in  our  re 
ligious  course  we  should  employ  all  the  appointed 
means  of  grace  more  steadily,  if  we  set  their  end 
more  clearly  before  us ;  if  we  were  fully  per 
suaded  as  to  the  object  we  are  looking  for,  living 
for,  —  if  we  knew  exactly  what  we  expected  the 
Gospel  to  do  for  us. 

We  expect  it,  of  course,  to  save  us;  but 
when,  —  in  this  world  or  in  the  future  one  ?  to 
save  us,  but  from  what,  —  our  sins,  or  only 
from  the  punishment  denounced  against  them  ? 
What  is  it  that  we  mean  by  this  word,  so  often 
upon  our  lips,  Salvation  ?  Does  it  comprehend 
all  that  can  make  either  this  world  or  the  next 
one  desirable,  in  the  restoration  to  God's  favor, 
and  the  recovery  of  our  lost  birthright  of  happi 
ness  in  Him  ;  or  is  our  idea  of  it  restricted  to 
that  "  escaping  from  Hell  and  going  to  Heaven," 
to  which  it  has  been  so  truly  said  *  the  mere 
ordinary  notion  of  it  is  limited?  I  will  not 
dwell  upon  the  low  and  servile  character  with 
which  thoughts  such  as  these  invest  an  estate 
whose  essential  attribute  is  liberty ;  I  will  but 
ask  the  followers  of  Him  whose  name  was 
called  Jesus,  that  He  might  save  His  people 
from  their  iniquities,  if  they  hate  sin  because 

*  Wesley. 


28  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

their  God  hates  it,  or  only  because  He  punishes 
it  ?  Is  it  from  the  accursed  thing  itself,  or  only 
from  the  consequences  of  its  being  found  upon 
them,  that  they  pray  and  strive  to  be  delivered  ? 
I  will  not  dwell  upon  the  unworthiness  of  such 
views.  I  would  only  point  out  their  insuffi 
ciency.  It  will  go  hard  with  us  in  the  Battle 
that  is  sore  against  us,  if  we  are  to  find  our  foes 
in  the  present,  and  only  to  look  for  our  friends 
in  the  future.  The  Devil  occupies  a  visible 
kingdom,  the  World  holds  an  open  market,  the 
flesh  wages  an  ever-present  warfare  ;  and  is  not 
the  Salvation  which  cometh  from  the  Lord  that 
which  shall,  yea,  which  doth,  deliver  us  from  all 
of  these,  a  real  work,  a  present  work,  a  con 
scious  work,  a  far  more  complete  and  glorious 
work,  than  hands  which  hang  down  are  able  to 
embrace,  and  eyes  looking  two  ways  are  able  to 
behold  ?  Does  not  God's  Covenant,  when  read 
by  its  own  light,  disclose  itself  as  a  Covenant, 
even  in  this  present  time,  of  life  and  peace  ? 
If  any  of  us  have  not  yet  found  it  to  be  so,  it 
is  because  in  this  great  matter  we  have  yet 
much  to  learn  of  God,  both  in  His  Word  and 
in  His  Work.  To  the  Law,  saith  the  Prophet, 
and  to  the  Testimony.  If  they  speak  not  ac 
cording  to  this  word,  if  the  personal  experience 
of  believers  does  not  agree  with  the  outward 


A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN.  29 

revelation  they  live  under,  it  is  because  they 
have  no  light  in  them. 

We  have  been  considering  Religion  as  a  Di 
vine  science  ;  it  is  not  like  the  earthly  ones  in 
this,  that  there  is  no  royal  road  into  its  myste 
ries  :  none  may  penetrate  into  these  who  have 
not  placed  themselves  under  devout  and  diligent 
subjection  to  its  laws,  —  but  will  not  the  high 
way  of  simple  obedience,  in  which  our  King 
Himself  was  content  to  travel,  lead  us  on  step 
by  step,  until  we  enter  into  the  possession  of 
secrets  which  make  all  outward  requirements 
easy?  "  Mysteries  are  revealed  unto  the  meek." 
Is  there  not  such  a  thing  as  the  gradual  growth 
of  an  affection,  which,  by  placing  the  heart's 
deliberate  desire  and  preference  and  choice  in 
God,  induces  a  conformity  to  His  will  in  all 
things,  and  makes  His  every  command  to  be 
obeyed,  not  from  the  pressure  of  an  enforced 
law,  but  through  the  unfolding  of  an  inward 
principle  ?  Is  there  not  a  state  in  which  those 
who  are  in  Christ  attain  to  that  realization  of 
their  privileges  which  St.  Paul  desired  for  his 
Galatian  converts,  those  little  children  for  whom, 
although  they  were  already  born  unto  God,  he 
travailed  in  birth  again,  until  the  Son,  of  whose 
Spirit  they  had  received,  was  "  formed  in  them," 
—  until  the  mind  which  was  in  them  was  also 


30  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

the  mind  which  was  in  Christ  Jesus,  —  until 
they  were  complete  in  Him,  in  attainments  as 
well  as  in  privileges? 

We  are  told  that  God  loveth  a  cheerful  giver : 
it  is  His  own  blessed  characteristic  to  give  boun 
tifully,  upbraiding  not ;  may  we  not,  therefore, 
believe  that  He  is  favorable  to  the  free  and 
willing  receiver  of  His  goodness  ?  Yet,  as  the 
Israelites  were  slow  to  enter  upon  the  Promised 
Land,  so  are  we  slow  to  enter  upon  the  Pur 
chased  one  ;  we  do  not  "  eat  the  good  "  of  the 
land  which  has  been  bestowed  upon  us  in  Christ, 
and  through  an  evil,  if  unsuspected,  heart  of 
unbelief,  a  secret  distrust  in  God's  loving-kind 
ness,  we  fall  short,  as  they  did,  of  the  rest 
which  even  here  He  has  provided  for  His  peo 
ple,  —  a  rest,  for  the  want  of  which  no  Pisgah 
view  can  altogether  console  us.  Too  many 
among  us  are  like  the  spies,*  we  confess  that 
it  is  a  good  land,  but  exaggerate  the  difficulties 
of  attaining  it ;  its  old  dwellers  (the  deeply- 
seated  infirmities  of  the  flesh)  seem  too  strong 
to  be  overcome  :  but  as  Caleb  and  Joshua  said, 
and  for  this  were  so  singularly  blessed  by  God, 
"  Let  us  go  up  at  once  and  possess  it,  for  we  are 
well  able  to  overcome  it ;  the  Lord  is  with  us." 
How  long,  asks  Joshua,  are  ye  slack  to  possess 

*  Num.  xiii.  14. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 


31 


the  land  which  the  Lord  hath  given  you  ?  In 
these  very  words  may  Faith  now  urge,  admon 
ish,  and  encourage  us  to  enter  upon  far  richer 
blessings,  far  ampler  privileges,  —  even  those 
laid  up  for  us  in  Christ.  And  if  we,  conscious 
of  our  inherent  feebleness,  should  ask,  "  By 
whom  shall  Jacob  go  up,  for  he  is  but  small  ?  " 
we  have  our  answer  given  us,  — 

"  Not  by  Might  nor  by  Power,  but  by  my 
Spirit,  said  the  Lord." 

"I  will  therefore  look  to  the  Lord,  who  hideth  his  face 
From  the  house  of  Jacob;  yet  will  1  look  to  Him; 
Should  not  a  people  seek  their  God, 
Should  they  seek  instead  of  the  living  to  the  Dead  ? 
Unto  the  command  and  unto  the  testimony  let  them  seek. 
If  they  will  not  speak  according  to  this  word, 
In  which  there  is  no  obscurity, 

Every  one  of  them  shall  pass  through  the  land  distressed  and 
famished." 


UNIVERSITY! 


II. 


THE  GOSPEL  RECEIVED   PARTIALLY. 

"  Said  I  not  unto  thee,  that,  if  thou  wouldest  believe,  thou  shouldest  see 
the  glory  of  God  ?  " 

N  assuming  unbelief  to  be  the  ground 
work  of  practical  disobedience,  I  do 
not  mean  to  ignore  the  presence  and 
the  power  of  those  other  opposing 
forces,  —  the  enmity  of  the  natural  will,  the 
attractions  of  the  outward  world,  to  which  the 
transgression  of  God's  law  is  so  often  attributed 
by  the  sacred  writers  ;  I  would  only  point  out 
that  these  are  but  secondary  causes,  merely 
symptomatic  in  their  nature,  and  witnessing  to 
that  which  lies  beneath  them  all,  "  a  departing 
from  the  living  God,"  to  which  all  these  other 
departures  may  be  traced  back.  Over  the  soul 
which  believes  in  God  the  attractive  hold  of 
outward  sense  is  loosened,  as  in  the  soul  which 
through  belief  has  received  Him  within  itself 


A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN.  33 

the  resistance  of  inward  enmity  is  overcome. 
"  The  beginning  of  Faith,"  saith  the  Apocry 
pha,  yet  herein  a  true  Scripture,  "  is  the  cleav 
ing  unto  God,"  *  and  it  is  only  through  failure 
in  this  steadfast  cleaving  that  the  foes,  who 
from  without  or  within  war  against  the  soul, 
are  enabled  to  prevail  against  it ;  without  the 
footing  which  unbelief  gives,  they  who  hate  us, 
though  they  may  indeed  assault  us  and  afflict,, 
can  never  become  lords  over  us.  In  the  soul 
which  Faith  has  rooted  and  established  in  God, 
the  enemy  asks  as  vainly  as  did  Archimedes  of 
this  earthly  globe,  for  "  a  point "  wherefrom  to 
remove  it  from  its  steadfastness  ;  so  long  as  it 
believes,  it  remains,  with  Him  unto  whom  be 
lief  unites  it,  "  among  the  things  which  cannot 
be  shaken,''  —  fixed,  like  the  limpet,  upon  the 
Rock  of  Ages. 

There  is  an  attractive  power  of  the  world,  a 
seductive  weakness  of  the  flesh,  a  deep-seated 
malignity  of  the  Devil,  working  through  each  of 
these  to  our  ruin.  The  world  has  something  to 
show,  the  flesh  something  to  crave,  the  Devil 
something  to  give,  and  more  to  promise  ;  these 
are  all  strong  men  armed,  having  mouths  speak 
ing,  asking,  boasting  great  things,  and  to  all  of 
these,  their  allurements,  solicitations,  and  temp- 

*  Ecclus.  xxv.  12. 
2*  n 


34  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

tations,  the  coming  in  of  Him  who  is  stronger 
than  they  has  but  one  thing  to  oppose,  a  weapon, 
single,  yet  mighty  and  effectual  to  the  pulling 
down  of  all  their  strongholds,  —  FAITH,  intimate, 
adhesive,  and  reliant  in  an  ever-living  and  ever- 
present  -God,  Baal's  prophets  are  and  have 
always  been  many,  but  this  one  prophet  and 
witness  of  the  Lord,  even  though,  like  Elijah, 
it  remain  alone,  is  strong  enough  to  withstand 
and  to  overcome  them  all ;  for  this  is  the  Vic 
tory  which  overcometh  the  World,  the  world 
of  sense  without,  the  world  of  sin  within  us, 
even  our  Faith  in  Him  who  hath  overcome  all 
things  for  and  in  His  people.  The  world  is  so 
•much  to  us,  only  because  God  is  so  little  ;  let 
Faith  but  once  restore  the  soul  to  its  true  centre, 
so  that,  looking  at  Divine  realities  from  a  just 
medium,  it  may  see  them  in  their  true  and 
unspeakable  importance,  and  the  power  of  out 
ward  things  is  weakened,  and  their  overween 
ing  charm  dissolved,  —  the  enchanter's  wand  is 
broken,  and  his  spell  read  backward. 

We  have  all,  I  think,  felt  it  to  be  thus  with 
us  in  moments  of  peculiar  emergency,  when 
some  one  overwhelming  idea,  whether  it  might 
be  of  God,  of  judgment,  or  of  eternity,  with  its 
accompanying  pressure  of  self-conscious  moral 
responsibility,  has  been  flashed  out  upon  the 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  35 

soul  in  awful  distinctness,  as  we  sometimes  see 
objects  thrown  into  ghastly  relief  from  the  very 
blackness  of  the  thunder-cloud  behind  them  :  at 
such  moments  the  things  we  have  most  prized 
and  clung  to  seem  so  insignificant  that  we  can 
only  confess  and  wonder  at  the  delusion  through 
which  they  have  ever  appeared  of  value.  That 
impressions  of  this  intense  nature  should  be 
abiding  would  neither  accord  with  the  nature 
of  true  Faith,  nor  with  the  performance  of  the 
work  which  God  has  given  it  to  do.  Yet  to 
have  been  their  subject  even  for  a  moment  is  to 
be  convinced  that  where  these  awful,  and  as  yet 
unseen,  realities  are  felt  and  appreciated  in  their 
true  prominence,  and  realized  in  their  actual 
relation  to  ourselves,  all  meaner  things  will  sink 
into  a  lower  position.  The  shadow  will  flee 
before  the  Substance,  and  it  is  because*  we 
have  not,  through  faith,  laid  hold  upon  this 
substance,  —  because  we'  allow  the  visible  too 
much  to-  obscure  and  exclude  the  real,  that 
inward  corruption  retains  its  strength,  and  out 
ward  temptation  acquires  its  power. 

Let  us  consider  this  a  little  further.  Sin,  or 
disobedience  towards  God,  is  only  unbelief  in 
an  outward  and  visible  form  ;  it  is  the  practical 
denial  of  God's  existence,  the  virtual  disowning 

*  See  Note  C. 


36  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

of  His  authority ;  the  saying  in  our  lives  what 
we  have  already  said  in  our  hearts,  either  that 
"  there  is  no  God,"  or  that,  if  there  be  indeed 
such  an  One,  "  we  will  not  have  Him  to  reign 
over  us."  To  enter  into  this  more  fully,  we 
need  but  to  consider  how  the  lives  of  us  all  are 
moulded  and  fashioned  from  within ;  to  mark 
how  our  conduct,  even  in  the  most  ordinary 
affairs  of  daily  life,  is  but  the  expression  of  our 
inner  sentiment,  an  impress  corresponding  in 
every  line  with  the  stamp  which  opinion  and 
feeling  have  set  upon  it.  Of  the  least  thought 
ful  and  reflective  man  among  us,  we  may  say, 
"that  even  as  he  thinketh  in  his  heart,  so  is 
he."  His  life  will  be,  however  unconsciously  to 
himself,  the  result  and  manifestation  of  certain 
principles,  be  these  good  or  bad  or  indifferent ; 
and  even  those  who,  according  to  the  common 
saying,  have  "no  principle,"  who  are  without 
any  fixed  rule  or  settled  basis  for  action,  will 
be  found  to  be  guided  by  opinions,  however 
vague,  and  to  be  under  the  influence  of  senti 
ments,  however  fluctuating.  We  are  accustomed 
to  smile  at  the  man  over  whom  abstract  thought 
has  gained  such  an  ascendency  as  to  make  the 
things  (however  purely  intellectual)  with  which 
his  mind  is  daily  conversant  appear  to  him  in 
the  light  of  tangible  realities,  yet  we  are  all  of 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  37 

us,  without  suspecting  it,  as  much  under  the 
Empire  of  Ideas  as  he  is  :  it  is  what  we  think 
about  things,  what  we  feel  about  them,  what,  in 
short,  they  are  to  us,  that  gives  them  their  true 
significance.  Even  in  the  case  of  whatever 
may  be  most  palpable  and  material,  it  is  not 
the  mere  beholding  of  it  with  our  eyes,  or  being 
made  conscious  of  its  presence  by  any  other  of 
the  senses,  that  makes  it  real  to  us  ;  until  the 
spirit  discerns,  grasps,  and  appropriates  unto 
itself  the  substance,  until  the  Inner  and  the 
Outward  meet  and  kiss  each  other,  "  seeing  we 
do  not  perceive,  and  hearing  we  do  not  under 
stand."  What,  for  instance,  is  music  to  those 
who,  in  familiar  parlance,  do  not  care  about  it  ? 
They  hear  it,  but  it  tells  them  nothing  ;  it  has 
no  message  to  deliver,  no  revelation  to  impart. 
What  is  the  most  magnificent  scenery  the  world 
can  offer  to  the  man  or  woman  who,  placed  in 
the  midst  of  it,  is  thinking  of  something  else, 
whether  that  "  something  else "  may  be  the 
mightiest  or  the  most  trivial  affair  with  which 
human  thought  can  be  occupied  ?  Indeed,  in 
so  much  do  all  mortal  affairs,  from  the  great 
est  to  "  the  meanest  thing  of  every  day,"  bear 
witness  to  the  power  of  the  unseen  over  the 
visible,  that  every  aim  and  aspiration  that  the 
human  heart  can  frame  is  but  an  unconscious 


38  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

confession  that  Man,  according  to  the  degree  in 
which  the  conditions  of  his  Being  are  raised 
above  those  of  mere  animal  existence,  does  not 
live  by  bread  alone  ;  his  life  is  set  between  the 
spiritual  and  the  material,  and  the  outward 
object  can  only  nourish  and  delight  him  in 
proportion  to  its  correspondence  with  the  inner 
need. 

The  very  mutability  of  human  wishes,  the 
vanity  to  which  Man  is  subject,  is  a  proof,  if 
but  a  melancholy  one,  of  the  dignity  of  his 
nature,  and  indicates  the  immeasurable  distance 
by  which  he  is  removed  from  the  inferior  races, 
which  (each  one  after  his  kind)  love,  seek,  and 
are  contented  with  the  objects  adapted  to  their 
simple  requirements,  without  versatility  or  sa 
tiety.  Instinct  is  an  unerring,  unvarying  guide  : 
to  have  at  one  time  observed  an  animal's  habits 
is  to  know  what  will  at  all  times  make  it  happy ; 
but  it  is  more  hard  to  search  into  and  satisfy 
what  an  old  Divine  has  called  the  covetous,  rest 
less,  insatiable  heart  of  man  ;  and  this  because 
all  men,  no  less  than  the  just  one,  live  by 
Faith,  —  have  all  a  spiritual  element  of  existence, 
have  all  an  ideal  standard,  be  it  lowly  or  lofty, 
false  or  true,  with  reference  to  which  they  are 
guided  in  choice  and  act.  If  we  would  obtain 
the  key  to  any  man's  conduct,  we  must  make 


A  PRESENT  HEA  YEN.  39 

ourselves  acquainted  with  his  Creed,  —  we  must 
find  out  what  it  is  he  believes  in,  if  we  would 
learn  what  it  is  he  lives  for,  and  in,  and  by. 
Until  we  have  gained  the  secret  of  this  corre 
spondency,  our  lives  are,  as  regards  each  other, 
writ  in  cipher.  Could  we  but  look  at  outward 
things  from  one  common  stand-point,  all  would 
be  plain  and  legible,  and  it  is  our  inability  to  do 
this  which  makes  us  such  riddles  and  contradic 
tions  to  each  other ;  for  even  those  who  most 
Jove  the  world  do  not  love  the  same  world  : 
they  who  are  serving  the  same  master  serve 
him  under  such  different  aspects  that  their  aims 
are  oftentimes  as  little  intelligible  to  each  other 
as  they  are  to  him  who,  bent  upon  a  higher  ob 
ject,  cares,  comparatively  speaking,  for  none  of 
the  things  on  which  their  desires  are  set.  The 
ambitious  man,  the  covetous  one,  the  pleasure- 
seeker,  stare  at  each  other  in  wonder,  perhaps 
in  pity,  while  the  man  who  has  placed  his  aim 
in  every-day  comfort  and  respectability  gazes  at 
all  three  with  an  inquiring  cui  bono  ?  They 
who  live  in  the  affections  cannot  understand 
how  others  should  place  their  happiness  in  the 
exertion  of  the  intellect.  The  purely  domestic 
character  is  at  a  loss  to  appreciate  the  charm 
with  which,  to  differently  constituted  minds, 
social  or  political  distinction  is  invested.  Fame 


40  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

is  a  shadow,  gold  is  dross,  pleasure  a  bubble, 
knowledge  vanity  and  vexation  of  spirit,  to  those 
who  do  not  care  about  them  ;  but  to  the  man  to 
whom  any  one  of  these  is  an  object  of  preference 
and  deliberate  choice,  who  has  (whether  wisely 
or  unwisely)  set  it  before  him  as  his  happiness 
and  final  good,  the  end  to  which  his  life  and 
energies  have  become  the  means,  it  is  as  the 
breath  of  his  nostrils,  an  indispensable  element 
of  existence,  in  short,  a  reality,  be  its  nature 
bad  or  good,  its  essence  palpable  or  unseen. 
The  things  which  men  desire,  pursue,  and  be 
lieve  in,  low  and  trivial  and  unworthy  as  they 
may  be  in  themselves,  are,  to  the  persons  whom 
they  thus  influence,  "  no  vain  thing,  but  their 
life,"  —  the  subtle  mainspring  of  thought  and 
action,  hidden  and  mysterious,  and  like  that 
which  it  so  closely  resembles,  the  principle  of 
natural  vitality,  only  to  be  discovered  in  its 
workings. 

To  understand  this  —  that  just  according  to 
the  degree  in  which  anything  earthly  or  divine 
has  become  a  felt  reality,  it  will  make  itself  a 
part  of  our  thoughts  and  lives  —  will  lead  to 
the  apprehension  of  a  higher  Truth.  We  shall 
find  ourselves  more  able  to  appreciate  the  cen 
tral  position  in  which  the  system  of  revealed 
religion  has  placed  the  faculty  through  whose 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  41 

aid  alone  the  invisible  things  to  which  that 
system  introduces  us  can  be  seen  in  their 
absolute  awfulness  and  beauty,  or  recognized  in 
their  unspeakable  relative  importance  to  our 
selves.  Revelation,  as  regards  our  spiritual 
Being,  places  every  one  of  us  where,  as  regards 
mere  natural  existence,  Creation  set  down  the 
first  Father  of  our  Race,  in  a  wrorld  where  all 
that  surrounds  us  is  new,  and  only  to  be  appre 
hended  through  the  exercise  of  Faith,  the  soul's 
single  yet  sufficing  sense,  —  the  spiritual  eye, 
and  ear,  and  touch,  and  taste,  and  discerning,  — 
the  appointed  medium  between  the  human  soul 
and  Him  who  gave  it ;  without  which  it  can  as 
little  acquaint  itself  with  God,  and  with  that 
inner  world  wherein  \vith  Him  it  lives,  and 
moves,  and  has  its  being,  as  it  can  learn  any 
thing  of  His  outward  world  without  the  aid 
and  intervention  of  the  bodily  senses.  Until  we 
have  availed  ourselves  of  this  medium,  things 
that  most  surely  are  remain  virtually  to  us  as 
though  they  were  not.  We  go  on  limiting  our 
notion  of  the  actual  to  the  merely  visible  until 
even  our  use  of  the  term  "  spiritual,"  witness 
ing  as  it  does  to  realities  more  tremendous,  and, 
so  to  speak,  more  real  in  their  essence  and  opera- 
tion  than  any  which  can  come  under  the  cogni* 
zance  of  our  material  senses,  carries  with  it  the 


42  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

idea  of  something  shadowy,  vague,  and  impal 
pable.  Yet  the  Heaven  we  hope  for,  and  the 
Hell  we  dread,  are  as  much  realities,  though 
unseen  ones,  as  the  Earth  we  tread  on.  The 
kingdom  of  God  within  us,  though  it  cometh 
not  with  observation,  exists  as  surely  as  the 
kingdom  of  this  world  without  us.  God  him 
self —  for  the  deeper  these  inquiries  go,  the 
surer  do  they  send  us  back  upon  that  awful 
ground  and  substance  of  all  things,  visible  and 
invisible  —  is  the  self-existent  source  and  spring 
of  all  Reality,  though  no  man  hath  seen,  or  can 
see  Him,  at  any  time  ;  and  He  is  only  to  be 
beholden  as  in  a  glass  darkly,  in  such  of  His 
works  as  have  been  seen  clearly  from  the  foun 
dation  of  the  world. 

Let  us  think  of  this  a  little  longer;  let  us 
look,  by  the  light  of  our  every-day  experience, 
a  little  more  closely  into  the  nature  of  Belief. 
To  believe  in  anything,  whether,  as  in  the  case 
of  a  truth,  we  may  accept  it  on  the  evidence  of 
soul  or  reason,*  or  admit  it,  being  a  fact,  on  the 

*  It  is  well  to  bear  in  mind  that  Faith,  although  it  transcends 
Reason,  is  none  the  less,  in  the  first  instance,  founded  upon  it. 
Belief,  inasmuch  as  it  is  a  species  of  mental  choice  or  preference, 
presupposes  a  certain  exercise  of  judgment;  and  Fe'ne'lon,  I  re 
member,  illustrates  this  position  by  comparing  Faith  with  a  guide, 
in  whom,  because  we  have  first  satisfied  ourselves  with  regard  to 
his  character  and  qualifications,  we  place  implicit  reliance,  and 
having  let  our  judgment  act  once  for  all  in  resigning  it  to  him, 
follow  where  he  leads  without  question. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  43 

witness  of  outward  sense,  or  the  testimony  of 
others,  is  to  receive  it  with  that  thorough  per 
suasion  which  will  not  fail  to  guide  our  actions 
so  far  as  they  may  be  connected  with  the  fact  or 
truth  in  question,  with  a  reference  to  its  ac 
knowledged  existence.  Belief,*  whether  its  ob 
ject  is  connected  with  this  world  or  the  spiritual 
one,  which  fails  to  embody  itself  in  action,  is 
such  only  in  name,  and  stops  short  of  genuine 
conviction.  Put  a  man  engaged  in  business  in 
possession  of  tidings  immediately  affecting  the 
affair  he  has  in  hand,  the  information  he  thus 
receives  will  necessarily  influence  his  plan  of 
action,  and  will  do  so  in  exact  proportion  to  his 
confidence  in  its  authenticity,  and  to  the  degree 
of  importance  he  is  disposed  to  attach  to  it,  sup 
posing  its  authenticity  to  be  placed  beyond  a 
doubt.  Let  us  turn  this,  by  way  of  illustration, 
to  the  one  great  concern  of  spiritual  life,  and  we 
shall  be  prepared  to  meet  the  remarkable  state 
ment  of  Baxter,  who,  in  his  later  years,  gives, 
as  the  result  of  a  life-long  experience  among  the 
souls  of  men,  his  firm  conviction  that  the  true 
cause  for  the  indifference  and  godlessness  of  the 
great  mass  of  society  lies  in  this,  that  the  careless 
and  ignorant  who  compose  it  do  not,  in  a  specu 
lative  sense,  believe  in  God  or  in  a  future  world. 

*  See  Note  D. 


44  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

And  though  our  full  acquiescence  in  this  state 
ment  is  modified  by  the  knowledge  that,  man 
being  the  inheritor  of  a  perverted  will  as  well  as 
of  a  darkened  understanding,  the  intellect  may 
retain  a  sort  of  petrifying  hold  upon  truths  by 
which  the  will  remains  uninfluenced  ;  though  the 
course  of  every-day  life  shows  us  that  nothing  is 
more  easy  even  in  things  of  temporal  interest  than 
to  see  the  good,  and  yet  pursue  the  evil,  because 
it  is  preferred,  —  still  of  any  man  of  whom  it  may 
be  said  "  that  he  careth  not  for  God,  neither  is 
God  in  all  his  thoughts,"  it  may  also,  in  a  cer 
tain  sense,  be  affirmed  that  he  does  not  believe 
in  Him.  The  soul  over  which  the  ideas  of  God, 
and  judgment,  and  eternity  exert  no  practical 
influence,  has  never  received  them  within  itself 
as  conscious,  felt  realities ;  or  a  course  of  action 
in  correspondence  with  the  awful  sense  of  per 
sonal  accountability,  which,  when  so  received, 
they  must  inevitably  awaken,  would  not  so 
much  have  been  induced  as  compelled.  For 
acknowledging  a  Divine  revelation  to  be  true, 
the  facts  it  unfolds  are  so  confessedly  important, 
that  it  would  appear  hard  to  accept  the  facts  up 
on  which  our  eternal  weal  or  woe  depends,  as  wre 
would  accept  that  of  the  existence  of  Aurung- 
zebe  or  Charlemagne,  —  a  fact  truly,  but  one 
which  lies  apart  and  remote  from  us,  without 


A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN.  45 

bearing  on  our  present  day,  or  influence  upon 
our  individual  destiny,  —  something  which  has 
been,  and  is  done  with  forever. 

And  farther,  let  us  contrast  —  excepting  the 
case  of  persons  whose  peculiar  studies  have 
given  them  a  sort  of  individual  interest  in  such 
inquiries  —  our  general  reception  of  any  purely 
scientific  fact,  say  the  discovery  of  a  new  planet, 
with  that  which  we  accord  to  the  establishment 
of  a  point  or  principle  connected  with  any  great 
political  or  social  question,  or  with  any  of  those 
subjects  of  minor  yet  intimate  interest  which 
bear  upon  our  daily  health  and  comfort,  our  for 
tunes,  or  our  affections.  And  let  us  remember 
that  it  is  among  these  questions,  say  rather  above, 
and  yet  inclusive  of  them  all,  that  Christianity 
places  itself.  The  Gospel  is  no  historical  monu 
ment,  to  be  studied  or  left  alone  at  pleasure : 
it  does  not  challenge  attention  on  the  score  of 
its  curiosity  or  interest,  but  claims  it  on  the 
ground  of  its  personal  importance  to  every  one 
of  us.  It  proclaims  itself  to  be  "  no  vain  thing," 
in  the  sense  in  which  all  earthly  knowledge, 
how  excellent  and  glorious  soever,  is  vanity,  but 
"  the  life  "  of  those  whom  it  addresses.  When 
it  tells  us  of  a  God,  in  whose  favor  is  Life,  and 
makes  known  to  us  the  way  to  obtain  that  favor, 
there  is  no  moment,  either  of  our  present  or 


46  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

future  existence,  through  which  the  facts  it  re 
veals  do  not  send  a  pulsation  :  it  links  itself  with 
each  grain  of  the  sands  of  time,  with  each  billow 
of  the  ocean  of  eternity ;  it  has  to  do  with  all 
that  the  heart  and  soul  of  man  can  conceive  and 
execute,  endure  and  enjoy,  NOW  and  FOREVER. 
When  I  think  of  this  Gospel,  and  consider  how, 
like  Him  of  whom  it  testifies,  it  must  of  neces 
sity  be  everything  to  those  to  whom  it  is  any 
thing  at  all,  I  can  perceive  a  consistency,  if  a 
dreadful  one,  in  the  case  of  the  multitudes  who 
altogether  reject  and  ignore  it.  To  the  wicked 
"  who  know  not  God,  neither  desire  the  knowl 
edge  of  His  ways,"  God  is  nothing,  neither  do 
they  wish  to  be  anything  to  Him.  The  lan 
guage  of  their  hearts,  if  an  unspoken  one,  is 
none  the  less,  "  Depart  from  us,"  and  their  in 
difference  to  the  great  means  of  salvation  is 
more  than  accounted  for  by  their  acknowledged 
contempt  for  its  end ;  but  it  is  so  far  otherwise 
with  them  to  whom  the  end  —  even  the  end 
of  all  faith,  the  salvation  of  their  souls  —  is 
precious,  and  desired  above  all  good,  that  I  am 
at  a  loss  to  understand  how  many  among  us,  so 
esteeming  the  end,  seem  yet  so  inadequately  to 
appreciate  and  avail  ourselves  of  the  means :  in 
other  words,  I  cannot  learn  how  it  is  that  the 
Gospel  has  become  to  us  (in  the  sense  which  I 


A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN.  47 

have  attached  to  the  word  Reality)  a  less  real 
thing  than  the  world  it  has  to  contend  with,  and 
the  sin  it  has  to  overcome.  We  have  slipped, 
as  a  Christian  people,  into  a  position  far  below 
the  one  given  us  by  God ;  and  while  we  are 
ready,  as  I  have  said,  to  accuse  ourselves  of 
want  of  diligence  in  making  our  calling  and 
election  sure,  is  it  certain  that  we  have  yet,  in 
the  words  of  the  Apostle,  seen  our  calling  and 
attained  to  a  just  appreciation  of  what,  on  our 
part,  is  the  hope  of  this  calling,  and  what, 
on  God's  part,  is  the  exceeding  greatness  of 
His  power  wrought  in  Christ  to  us-ward  that 
believe  ? 

It  has  been  well  said,  with  regard  to  objects 
of  temporal  interest,  that  we  must  know  some 
thing  of  a  thing  before  we  can  feel  any  curiosity 
respecting  it ;  the  very  desire  for  information 
on  a  subject  presupposing  the  presence  of  an 
already  awakened  spring  of  interest.  Now 
when  I  apply  this  truth  to  the  highest  fact  it 
can  concern,  and  consider  of  how  many  things 
having  to  do  with  the  deeper  and  more  intimate 
relations  of  the  human  soul  with  God  we 
"  willingly  remain  ignorant,"  I  cannot  but  feel 
justified  in  tracing  back  this  ignorance,  and  the 
indifference  with  which  it  is  twin-born  and 
twin-existent,  to  the  want  of  a  firm  belief  in 


48  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

those  great  fundamental  truths  of  Revelation 
upon  which  the  fabric  of  man's  salvation  rests. 
We  do  not  know  enough  of  God  to  make  us 
wish  to  know  more,  and  have  yet  need  of  being 
rooted  and  grounded  in  the  first  principles  of 
salvation.  For  until  these  are  more  to  us  than 
matters  of  (so-called)  faith,  until  they  are  unto 
us  matters  of  life,  things  not  merely  to  be  held 
by  as  traditions,  but  to  be  lived  upon  as  facts,  — 
things  that  we  feel  we  could  not  do  without,  and 
to  resign  our  hold  upon  which  would  be  con 
sciously  to  let  go  a  portion  of  our  Being,  —  we 
do  not  truly  believe  them,  we  only  say  that  we 
do  so.  We  do  not  believe  them  —  I  speak  now 
of  verities  which  it  would  shock  us,  in  a  dog 
matic  sense,  to  doubt  —  until  they  have  passed 
within  our  souls  as  principles,  and  raised  up 
within  those  souls  the  power  and  energy  of  their 
own  life.  In  these  two  words,  the  most  solemn 
which  human  lips  can  frame,  "  I  BELIEVE,"  lies  a 
power  to  ingraft  the  soul  that  utters  them  from 
its  depths,  into  the  very  strength  and  fulness  of 
every  truth  of  which  they  are  spoken  ;  and  when 
I  think  of  this,  and  recall  the  great  fact  whereof 
we  affirm  most  constantly  that  we  "  believe  "  it, 
I  mean  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  I  long  that 
we  should  pass,  as  regards  it,  from  the  confession 
of  the  lips,  which  is  Orthodoxy,  to  the  confession 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  49 

of  the  heart,  which  is  Salvation.  For  to  beliere 
in  One  God,  the  Father  of  men  and  spirits,  re 
vealed  to  us  in  His  Son's  life,  reconciled  to  us 
through  His  Son's  death,  and  imparted  to  us 
through  the  agency  of  the  life-giving  Spirit, 
is  to  live  in  the  sense,  to  rely  upon  the  strength, 
and  to  rejoice  in  the  sweetness  of  a  Divine 
relationship.  It  is  to  know  that  we  are  no 
longer  strangers  and  foreigners  with  our  Godr 
but  to  feel  that,  in  the  bonds  of  this  everlasting 
covenant,  He  is  in  us,  and  we  are  in  Him, 
brought  near  by  the  Son,  kept  near  by  the 
Spirit,  bound  together  in  a  threefold  cord  which 
shall  not  be  quickly  broken. 

Until  we  thus  learn  to  realize  and  draw  the  full 
value  from  the  truths  which  are  most  common 
ly,  in  the  sense  of  speculative  assent,  believed 
among  us,  we  shall  be  at  a  loss  to  understand 
how  it  is  that  the  Apostles,  speaking  unto  us 
by  the  Spirit,  continually  address  us  as  being 
already  in  *  possession  of  certain  assured  privi 
leges,  and  urge  us,  on  the  ground  of  that  posses- 

*  We  know  that  the  visible  Church  of  Christ  has  never  exhib 
ited  a  community  without  spot  or  blemish,  and  we  have  histori 
cal  evidence  for  the  imperfection  of  one  Church  particularly 
addressed  by  St.  Paul.  Yet  all  visible  members,  save  those  com 
ing  under  the  awful  exclusion  of  the  "  except  ye  be  reprobate," 
are  exhorted  to  repentance,  to  purity,  to  diligence,  as  the  case 
may  require,  not  on  the  ground  of  their  danger  in  being  without 
Christ,  but  on  that  of  their  responsibility  as  being  in  Him.  "Know 
3  D 


50  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

sion,  to  go  on  to  make  further  privileges,  gifts, 
and  promises  our  own.  The  Apostles,  speaking 
to  their  converts,  do  not  so  much  admonish  them 
as  would  probably  be  done  in  our  present  re 
ligious  teaching,  upon  the  ground  of  responsi 
bility  as  of  capability.  They  do  not  so  often 
say,  Because  ye  know  such  things,  ye  ought  so 
and  so  to  act,  as,  because  ye  know  and  have 
received,  ye  can  so  walk  and  please  God.  They 
base  their  arguments,  their  exhortations,  upon 
a  foregone  conclusion,  even  the  life  and  death 
.and  rising  again  of  our  Lord  Jesus,  and  the 
benefits  which  all  those  who  accept  Him  have 

ye  not  that  ye  are  members  of  Christ,  Temples  of  the  Holy  Ghost, 
habitations  of  God  through  the  Spirit?  " 

I  sometimes  wish  we  were,  as  a  people,  more  in  the  habit  of 
considering  our  relations  with  God  under  .what  may  be  called 
their  covenanted  aspect.  Salvation  in  Christ  is  not  only  a  gift 
from  God  to  man,  it  is  also  a  bond,  a  living  perpetual  tie,  placing 
us  in  assured  relations  with  the  Father,  and  enabling  us  to  take 
up  that  ancient  plea,  "  Have  respect  unto  the  covenant,"  with  all 
-the  energies  of  the  renewed  nature.  "  The  writings  of  the  New 
Covenant,"  — how  I  love  this,  the  title  by  which  the  Gospel  writ 
ings  collectively  were  known  to  the  Primitive  Church!  It  brings 
them  before  us  as  that  which  they  truly  are,  the  very  bonds  and 
indentures  of  our  fellowship  in  -Christ  Jesus.  Perhaps  we  have 
lost  something  by  the  substitution  of  the  word  "  Testament,"  and 
yet  it  is  hard  to  choose ;  for  as  conveying  the  idea  of  a  gift  it 
bears  witness  to  the  freedom  of  Divine  grace,  the  fulness  of  Di 
vine  love.  Also  as  belonging  to  Death,  it  points  to  that  "  neces 
sary  "  death  of  the  Testator  upon  which  the  everlasting  covenant 
between  God  and  man  was  like  the  temporary  one,  established 
"  not  without  blood."  Gal.  iii.  15. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  51 

received,  and  are  even  now  receiving  thereby. 
They  do  not  stop  in  every  sentence,  as  we  are 
so  apt  to  do  in  our  daily  searchings  of  heart,  to 
break  down  the  wall  of  partition,  and  to  feel 
after  the  lurking  enmity ;  they  *  assume  that 
these  are  already  taken  away  and  abolished  in 
Christ ;  and  standing  in  this  Beautiful  Gate  of 
the  Temple,  His  full,  finished,  and  perfect  sacri 
fice,  satisfaction,  and  atonement  for  the  sins  of 
the  whole  world,  encourage  us  to  advance,  by 
this  new  and  living  way,  even  "  within  the 
Holiest."  Considering  this  deeply,  I  often 
think  that,  if  we  felt  the  Rock  under  us  as 
surely  as  they  did,  our  feet  would  move  more 
swiftly  on  the  path  of  perfection  to  which  they 
point,  and  incline  to  believe,  that  the  temple  of 
our  hearts  and  lives  is  less  "  fitly  framed  to 
gether  "  than  it  was  with  these  First  Builders, 
simply  because  it  is  not  based  so  firmly  upon 
the  One  Foundation ;  and  yet  I  say  this  with 
diflidence,  because  I  have  long  been  persuaded 
that  there  is  no  fact  with  which  the  Gospel  ac 
quaints  us  in  which  the  generality  of  Christians 
so  truly  believe,  and  so  sincerely  rest  their  hopes 
of  acceptance  with  God,  as  that  of  our  Saviour's 
Atonement.  In  many  facts  resting  upon  a  kin 
dred  basis  of  authority,  more  particularly  such 

*  Note  E. 


52  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

as  are  connected  with  the  nature,  office,  and 
agency  of  the  Third  Person  of  the  Blessed  Trin 
ity,  His  continual  indwelling  with  the  Faithful, 
and  the  fellowship  which  they  in  whom  He  abides 
enjoy  with  the  Father  and  the  Son,  I  dare  ven 
ture  to  assert  that  Christians  in  general  do  not 
believe ;  at  least,  if  we  may  judge  from  their 
habitual  modes  of  thought  and  expression,  these 
great  and  deeply  consolatory  realities  have  taken 
no  apparent  hold  upon  their  hearts  and  lives. 

Yet  it  would  be  to  charge  ourselves  falsely  to 
say,  that  the  great  doctrine  of  the  Atonement, 
the  keystone  of  salvation,  is  set  at  naught  by  us 
builders  ;  or  that  we  are  guilty  of  counting  this 
blood  of  the  everlasting  covenant  an  unholy  or 
unhallowing  thing.  For  while  to  those  who  are 
without,  the  necessary,  the  meritorious  death  of 
Christ  remains  the  stumbling-block  and  stone 
of  offence,  the  chosen  point  of  attack,  ever 
openly  assaulted,  ever  secretly  undermined,  to 
those  who  are  within,  the  Stone  thus  set  at 
naught  and  rejected  is  still  the  head  of  the 
corner :  it  is  still  the  tried  stone,  the  sure  foun 
dation,  the  Rock  whereof  Faith  speaks,  "  Set 
me  upon  it,  for  it  is  higher  than  I,"*  Love's 

*  "  When  I,"  saith  our  Lord,  "  am  lifted  up  from  the  earth,  I 
will  draw  all  men  unto  Me."  The  death  of  Christ  is  here  set 
forth  as  that  which  shall  most  powerfully  attract  the  heart  of 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  53 

sure,  abiding  Pillar  of  remembrance,  whereon 
Love's  secret  is  written  and  graven  with  a  pen 
of  iron  forever.  To  them  who  believe,  Christ  is 
precious.  Multitudes  among  us  live  and  die 
upon  no  other  hope  than  that  sure  and  certain 
one  set  before  us  in  merits  of  the  Lamb  slain 
from  the  foundation  of  the  world  ;  and  all  that 
I  would  say  is,  that  even  here,  where  we  most 
cordially  embrace  the  fact,  we  do  not,  for  want 
of  what  I  will  call  a  holy  and  courageous  Logic, 
accept  the  conclusion  to  which  it  directly  leads  ; 
and  by  thus  stopping  short,  we  fail  to  reach  the 
breadth,  and  height,  and  fulness  to  which  a 
single  and  simple  fact  like  the  great  one  in 
question,  if  implicitly  realized,  would  carry  us. 
If  we  would  have  the  Gospel  bless  us  wholly, 
we  must  receive  it  wholly :  we  must  let  our 
Lord,  the  Messenger  of  the  New  Covenant, 
make  full  proof  of  His  Ministry  among  us  ; 
and  remembering  that  a  Divine  Sentence  is 
upon  the  lips  of  this  Prince,  —  a  Word,  whereof 
it  may  be  truly  said,  that  "  which  way  soever 

man  to  God,  and  this  because  it  is  the  strongest  proof  of  love. 
Love  kindles  and  calls  forth  love;  "  We  count  that"  says  John  of 
Wessel,  "  to  be  the  most  lovable  which  we  know  to  be  the  most  loving." 
The  love  of  Christ  has  achieved  the  greatest  things,  and  hence 
must  produce  the  most  powerful  effects;  it  has  displayed  the 
greatest  devotedness,  and  consequently  must  possess  the  strongest 
attractive  power." 


54  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

we  turn  it  will  prosper,"  —  let  us  be  careful  to 
hearken  unto  all  that,  in  this  great  matter,  the 
Lord  our  God  has  spoken  concerning  us  ;  let  us 
take  heed  to  gather  up  each  crumb  of  this  true 
Bread,  to  wring  out  the  very  fulness  of  this 
Heavenly  Vine,  crushed  for  us  in  the  wine 
press  of  the  wrath  of  God. 

For  to  believe  in  the  Atonement,  that  is,  in 
the  Father  reconciled  to  us  in  His  Son,  and  in 
Him  propitious,  is  to  have  taken,  in  the  words 
of  the  Psalmist,  God  for  our  hope,  and  also  for 
our  portion  in  the  land  of  the  living  ;  it  is  to  be 
made  even  now  a  partaker  of  the  fulness  of 
Him  who  filleth  all  things,  and  to  enter  upon 
the  present  fruition  of  the  gifts  which  He, 
having  ascended  up  on  high,  has  received  for 
us  men.  In  this  greatest  boon,  even  that  of 
the  precious  blood-shedding  of  Christ,  all  lesser 
ones  are  of  necessity  included.  God  in  giving 
us  his  His  Son  has  given  us,  with  and  in  Him, 
as  the  Apostle  tells  us,  "  all  things."  To  accept 
Christ  Jesus  as  the  Way,  is  also  to  receive  Him 
as  the  Life  ;  to  rest  upon  His  sacrifice  as  per 
fect,  is  also  to  believe  that  it  is  sufficient,  not 
only  for  final  reconciliation  with  God,  but  for 
that  actual  restoration  to  His  favor,  which  the 
idea  of  true  reconciliation  includes.  I  long  that 
we  should  apprehend  this  essential  fact,  that 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  55 

"  God  is  in  Christ,  reconciling  the  world  unto 
Himself"  ;  because  I  am  convinced  that,  did  we 
see  the  Cross  more  clearly,  the  light  which 
streams  from  it  would  make  many  things  plain 
that  are  now  perplexing  ;  and  because  I  feel  we 
have  but  to  weigh  this  matter  in  the  balance  of 
Scripture  to  become  aware  of  how  much  we  are 
the  losers,  by  limiting  the  benefits  we  receive 
by  our  Lord's  meritorious  death  and  passion  to 
an  exemption  from  the  future  punishment  of 
sin.  To  this,  I  think,  the  generally  received 
estimate  of  our  Saviour's  satisfaction  is  re 
stricted,  to  a  degree  which  tends  to  reduce  the 
crowning  Sacrifice  to  the  level  of  those  which 
went  before  and  prefigured  it.  Our  Lord's 
Death,  the  very  substance  of  these  things  that 
foreshadowed  it,  is  invested  with  a  figurative, 
and,  so  to  speak,  typical  character  ;  and  this 
better  hope,  by  the  which  we  draw  nigh  unto 
God,  is  brought  down  to  a  shadow  of  good 
things  to  come  :  if  it  should  be  asked  when  ?  we 
might  answer,  in  the  hour  of  death,  and  in  the 
day  of  judgment,  for  it  seems  as  if  Christians, 
in  their  sincere,  yet  partial  acceptance  of  their 
Lord's  merits,  waited  until  then  to  plead  their 
efficacy  with  God.  Yet  is  this  Hope  set  before 
us  for  life  as  well  as  for  death,  not  only  in  the 
hour  and  the  day  of  which  no  man  knoweth, 


56  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

but  in  every  hour  and  day  of  this  our  mortal 
life,  in  all  time  of  our  tribulation,  in  all  time  of 
our  wealth,  from  the  sorest  pang  to  the  meanest 
provocation  of  every  day,  may  the  Christian, 
having  once  laid  hold  upon  it,  flee  unto  it  for 
refuge.  The  soul  which  can  say  with  St.  Paul, 
"  It  is  Christ  that  died,"  has  obtained  with  him 
a  triumphant  answer  to  every  doubt  within,  has 
found  a  stronghold  from  every  difficulty  without. 
Having  obtained,  through  the  one  Mediator,  a 
present  access  to  the  Father,  it  finds,  in  that 
access,  the  supply  of  all  its  deeply-felt  wants, 
the  satisfaction  of  all  its  yearnings. 

Having  entered  in  by  the  Door,  it  is  "  saved,"  — 

yea,  it  may  go  in  and  out,  and  find  pasture  ;  for 

He  who  has  delivered  our  souls  from  death  has, 

at  the  same  time,  delivered  our  eyes  from  tears, 

and  our  feet  from  falling.     "  Return,  then,  unto 

thy  rest,  O  my  soul,"  may  the  Christian  now 

say,  "for  thy  Lord  hath  dealt  bountifully 

with  thee !     He  who  is   become  thy 

salvation  will   be  also  thy  shield 

and  thy  song,  the  strength 

of  thy  life,  as  well 

as  thy  portion 

forever." 


III. 


THE   GOSPEL   RECEIVED   HISTORICALLY. 

"Say  not  in  thine  heart,  Who  shall  descend  into  the  deep,  to  bring  up 
Christ  again  from  the  dead?"  —  ROMANS  x.  7. 

HE  Gospel  is  a  history,  inasmuch  as 
it  sets  before  us  God  manifested  in 
the  flesh ;  a  power  or  Agency,  in 
asmuch  as  it  reveals  to  us  God  com 
municated  by  the  Spirit ;  and  the  life-walk  and 
triumph  of  Faith  consists  in  maintaining  these 
two  points  *  in  their  essential  connection,  and 
thus  keeping  God  —  seen  under  one  relation  and 
felt  under  the  other  —  "always  before  it."  I 
think  a  certain  deadness  of  the  letter  has  crept 
over  us,  because,  not  being  as  a  Christian  people 
sufficiently  at  home  in  our  own  polity  and  con 
stitution,  we  do  not  so  fully  as  in  the  Primitive 
Age  appreciate  the  vital  connection  which  exists 
between  the  great  facts  which  the  Gospel  re- 

*  See  Note  E. 


58  A  PRESENT  HEA  YEN. 

cords  and  the  great  principles  which,  through 
those  facts,  it  communicates.  We  seem  to  have 
in  some  degree  lost  what  the  first  builders  so 
abundantly  rejoiced  in,  a  principle  of  cohesion 
between  the  work  done  and  the  work  doing ; 
and  thus  the  events  with  which  the  Gospel  nar 
rative  makes  us  acquainted,  instead  of  being, 
every  one  of  them,  "  very  nigh  "  to  us,  bound 
up  and  interleaved  within  the  volume  of  our 
personal  experience,  have  to  be  fetched,  as  we 
want  them,  from  the  remote  distance  where  they 
lie,  like  the  bones  in  the  Valley  of  prophetic 
Vision,  dry  and  sapless,  detached  from  each 
other,  and  from  all  connection  with  the  life  that 
we  are  now  living  upon  earth.  When  we  re 
ceive  along  with  each  of  these  facts  the  sign 
which  was  given  unto  Moses,  and  learn  that  it 
is  *  I  AM  which  hath  sent  it  unto  us,  a  breath  of 

*  Time  Passion  always  passes  into  the  Present ;  we  see  this  in 
preaching  and  in  oratory;  even  in  narrative,  when  a  speaker 
warms,  he  leaves  the  dry  historic  manner  and  appears  to  describe 
what  is  at  present  passing  under  his  eyes.  Herder  says  that  the 
poverty  and  simplicity  of  the  Hebrew  verb,  which  has  scarcely 
more  than  one  tense,  tends  to  imprint  the  language  with  a  highly 
poetic  and  prophetic  character,  because  it  brings  all  things  within 
the  present  moment.  Most  languages,  he  says,  that  are  rich  in 
tenses,  have  perfected  them  through  historic  writing;  but  in  the 
Hebrew  record  —  an  inspired  poetry,  in  which  history  and  proph 
ecy  meet  —  the  want  of  exactness  is  not  felt,  and  the  very  ab 
sence  of  precision  and  certainty  tends  to  bring  the  now  into  clearer 
relief.  What  one  verse  in  the  prophetic  writings  relates  to  us  of 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  59 

life  is  infused  within  all  that  has  been  formal 
and  historical :  across  the  statements  of  the  letter, 
of  which,  taken  singly  and  apart,  we  may  have 
said  that  "  they  are  very  dry,"  a  spirit  passes, 
they  come  together*  and  behold,  "  they  live," 
and  stand  up  on  their  feet  an  exceeding  great 
army,  fighting  for  and  with  us  in  the  battle, 
which  is  like  the  one  recorded  in  Chronicles, 
both  behind  us  and  before. 

The  nominal  Christian  accepts  the  facts  which 
Revelation  imparts,  and  even  recognizes,  though 
but  in  a  vague  and  indeterminate  manner,  their 
bearing  and  influence  upon  his  spiritual  life  and 
eternal  destiny.  He  confesses,  in  a  speculative 
sense,  that  these  things  cannot  be  spoken  against : 
as  I  have  said,  he  believes  the  Gospel.  The 
experimental  Christian  believes  in  it.  To  him, 
the  events  with  which,  under  either  Covenant, 
the  records  of  inspiration  acquaint  him,  though 
not  mere  matters  of  history,  are  really  such  in  a 
deeper  and  fuller  meaning  than  we  are  accus 
tomed  to  attach  to  the  expression,  and  he  studies 
them  just  (to  compare  spiritual  things  with  tern- 
Past  time,  the  next  predicts  of  the  Future.  It  is  as  if  the  last  made 
tfie  presence  of  the  thing  enduring  and  eternal,  while  the  former  part 
gives  the  speech  the  certainty  of  past  time,  as  if  it  were  all  already 
fulfilled.  Thus  the  oneness  of  time  strengthens  the  expression 
both  ways. 

*  Ezekiel  xxxvii.  7. 


60  A  PRESENT  HE  A  VEN. 

poral)  in  the  spirit  in  which  he  would  investigate 
the  history  of  the  country  in  which  he  lives,  and 
with  whose  constitution  his  general  well-being  is 
identified.  As  the  inhabitant  of  a  great  and 
free  country,  he  cannot  but  be  aware  that,  under 
a  different  Past,  his  present  condition  and  future 
prospects  would  be  altogether  different.  Had 
not  this  battle  been  fought,  this  invader  repulsed, 
this  immunity  obtained,  this  charter  granted,  he 
would  hold  at  this  moment  a  less  favorable  posi 
tion  than  that  which  he  now  occupies.  And 
thus  are  the  Constitutions  of  our  Christian 
Polity  based  upon  a  grand  historic  Past,  from 
which  the  Present  draws  its  rich  capabilities,  the 
Future  its  blissful  certainties ;  upon  which,  as 
upon  a  foundation  which  cannot  be  shaken,  the 
kingdoms  of  grace  and  glory  have  been  estab 
lished,  and  without  which  each  of  them  would 
be  still,  as  to  earlier  ages,  no  more  than  a  dream, 
a  hope,  a  possibility. 

The  language  of  the  Apostles  is  that  of  men 
who,  knowing  wherein  and  whereby  they  stand, 
feel  and  rejoice  in  all  the  security  of  their  posi 
tion.  To  them,  the  Gospel,  as  yet  written  only 
in  the  life  and  death  and  rising  again  of  their 
Lord,  is  a  power,  an  energy,  in  the  strength  of 
which,  in  the  words  of  the  Prophet  Isaiah,*  they 

*  Isaiah  xxvii.  5. 


A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN.  61 

lay  hold  upon  God's  strength,  and  act,  and  pray, 
and  prevail.  For  in  each  event  of  our  Saviour's 
life  upon  earth  —  that  lively  Parable,  in  which 
the  Almighty,  no  longer  speaking  to  His  people 
by  words,  has  seen  fit  to  act  out  His  good  will 
and  pleasure  concerning  them  —  they  discern 
at  once  the  token,  accomplishment,  and  seal  of 
some  peculiar  purpose  of  God,  and  as  such  they 
accept,  feed  upon,  and  rest  in  it.  We  must  enter 
as  deeply  as  they  do  into  the  profound  and  mys 
terious  connection  which  exists  between  the 
natural  and  visible  life  of  Christ  upon  earth,  and 
the  spiritual  and  hidden  life  which  the  faithful 
soul  enjoys  with  Him  in  God,  before  we  can 
understand  the  tenacity  with  which  they  fasten 
upon  every  fact  of  our  Lord's  history,  and 
lay  upon  each  event  and  incident  of  His  life  a 
detaining  grasp,  that  will  not  let  it  go  until  it 
has  blessed  them.  We  never  find  them  contem 
plating  the  mystery  of  Redemption  as  an  exhibi 
tion  of  God's  power  and  mercy,  to  be  gazed  into 
as  by  the  angels  with  delighted  wonder.  This, 
they  say,  hath  God  done,  and  for  us.  They 
acknowledge  it  to  be  His  work,  a  work  wrought 
for  and  in  them,  perfect,  complete,  and  lacking 
nothing.  As  all  that  they  desire  is  to  be  found 
in  Christ,  "  in  whom  are  all  things,  and  by  whom 
all  things  consist"  (or  hold  together),  we  never 


62  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

find  them  drawing  the  distinction  between  Doc 
trine  and  Practice,  which  we  are  so  apt  to  make, 
or  treating  of  each  apart  from  the  other,  as  if  it 
were  a  matter  of  separate  obligation.  They 
know  too  well  in  how  much  all  that  we  are  or 
can  be,  the  newness  and  fulness  of  our  life  in 
God,  is  wrapped  up  and  involved  in  a  Saviour's 
accomplished  work,  to  think  of  detaching  either 
principle  or  precept  from  the  fact  from  which 
each  draws  its  life-blood. 

Seeing  this  truth  clearly,  that  God  hath  made 
Christ  unto  us  wisdom  and  righteousness,  sancti- 
fication  and  redemption,  all  their  teaching  leads 
back  to  Him,  in  whom,  as  within  a  burning 
focus,  the  various  manifestations  of  God's  power 
and  mercy,  the  glory  which  He  hath  in  Himself, 
the  grace  which  He  hath  evidenced  to  us,  have 
been  made  to  converge.  Since  all  that  was 
sometime  darkness  has  now  become  light  in  the 
Lord,  in  whom  it  has  pleased  the  Father  of  men 
and  spirits  that  all  fulness  should  dwell,  and 
through  whom,  by  the  Ministration  of  the  Spirit, 
He  has  willed  that  we  should  all  receive  of  that 
fulness,  they  are  no  longer  ignorant  of  God's 
feelings  towards  them,  no  longer  in  doubt  as  to 
His  purposes.  Within  this  new  and  living  Way 
the  Creator  and  His  creature  have  met,  been 
reconciled,  and  been  united ;  the  Divine  Nature 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  63 

has  come  down  to  meet  the  human,  the  human 
nature  has  been  taken  up  into  the  Divine. 
Therefore,  as  I  have  said,  the  Apostles  recognize 
a  continual  parallel  between  the  events  of  the 
life  which  Christ  lived  for  us,  and  those  of  the 
life  which  we  live  in  Him,  and  find  a  coun 
terpart  for  all  that  He  did  and  suffered  in 
the  natural  body  which  was  prepared  for  Him, 
in  what  is  even  now  being  transacted  around 
and  within  them  in  the  mystical  body,  spoken 
of  as  the  fulness  of  Him  which  filleth  all  in  all. 
In  all  that  Christ  has  wrought  for  them,  they 
discern  at  once  the  earnest  and  the  surety  of 
what  He  is  to  work  in  them ;  and  thus,  whether 
they  would  inquire  concerning  the  Will  or  the 
Doctrine,  their  feet  find  no  rest  but  in  growing 
to  the  blessed  steps  of  their  Lord's  most  holy 
life  upon  earth. 

All  that  the  servants  possess  is  derived  from 
the  Master,  upon  whose  hand  their  eyes  wait 
continually.  Without  Him,  and  independently 
of  the  Work  which  He  has  done,  they  are 
and  can  do  nothing ;  yet  with  Him,  and  by 
favor  of  what  He  has  accomplished  for  them, 
they  can  perform  all  things.  Therefore  they 
take  their  stand  upon  this  word,  —  Because. 
Because,  says  St.  John,  the  Word  was  made 
flesh  and  dwelt  among  us,  of  His  fulness  we 


64  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

have  all  received,  and  grace  for  grace.  Be 
cause  Christ,  in  this  body  of  our  humiliation, 
has  suffered  once  for  sin,  St.  Paul  admonishes 
his  converts  to  reckon  themselves  to  be  "  dead  " 
unto  it ;  and  because  He  has  taken  up  the  same 
body  into  the  life  and  glory  which  He  had  with 
the  Father  from  the  beginning,  he  exhorts  them 
to  number  themselves  among  those  who,  with 
their  risen  Lord,  "  are  alive  from  the  dead." 
All  their  carefulness,  their  zeal,  their  holy  anx 
iety  for  themselves  and  others,  tends  to  this  one 
point,  that  as  the  life  of  God  hath  been  made 
manifest  to  them  in  Christ  Jesus,  so  may  the 
life  of  Jesus  be  made  manifest  in  their  mortal 
flesh ;  so  that  He  who  hath  raised  up  the  body 
of  their  Lord  may  raise  up  their  spirits  in  the 
newness  of  the  life  which  is  in  Him.  Their 
sense  of  assimilation,  of  identification  with  Him, 
in  whom  they  live,  and  war,  and  triumph,  takes 
sometimes  a  strength  and  intimacy  of  expres 
sion  *  which  we,  self- withdrawn  farther  from  the 
centre  of  light,  and  warmth,  and  blessedness, 
are  almost  at  a  loss  to  understand.  Unto  these 
faithful  ones,  not  only  each  word  which  their 

*  As  when  St.  Paul,  in  holy  exultation,  says,  "  I  am  crucified 
with  Christ,  nevertheless  I  live  " ;  adding,  to  carry  out  the  more 
fully  his  sublime  meaning,  "  Yet  not  I,  but  Christ  liveth  in  me"; 
and  speaks  of  "  always  bearing  about  in  the  body  the  dying  "  and 
the  marks  "of  our  Lord  Jesus."  —  2  Cor.  iv.  10;  Gal.  vi.  17. 


A  PRESENT  HEA  YEN.  65 

Lord  hath  spoken,  but  every  deed  which  He 
hath  wrought,  is  even  as  it  were  bread  upon 
which  they  feed,  as  in  a  continual  Sacrament, 
and  set  before  their  hearers  the  food  by  which 
they  are  themselves  nourished,  saying,  "  Take, 
and  eat.  This  is  the  body  which  was  given  for 
you,  —  a  body  of  which  not  a  bone  must  be 
broken."  Of  all  which  their  Lord  has  done 
and  suffered  for  them  in  the  flesh,  they  can 
afford  to  lose  nothing ;  for  each  event  of  His 
History,  taken  and  received  by  Faith  in  Him,  is 
unto  them  an  outward  and  visible  Sign,  through 
the  power  and  efficacy  of  which  a  corresponding 
inward  and  spiritual  grace  is  conveyed  within 
the  believing  soul. 

Now,  to  us  these  facts  of  our  Lord's  history, 
taken  as  mere  facts,  are  as  real  as  they  were  to 
the  Apostles  ;  we  believe  as  firmly  as  they  did, 
that  to  reconcile  man  with  his  Maker,  Christ 
Jesus  took  upon  Him  our  human  nature,  and  as 
man  and  for  man,  lived,  suffered,  died,  rose 
again,  and  even  now  liveth  at  the  right  hand  of 
God.  With  them  we  also  connect  these  facts 
with  the  spiritual  interests  of  humanity,  and  con 
fess  that  it  was  for  our  sins  that  He  died,  for  our 
justification  that  He  rose  again.  How  comes 
it,  then,  that  our  faith,  as  compared  with  theirs, 
has  declined  into  a  dry  speculative  conviction,  — 


66  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

* 
the  assent  of  the  understanding  rather  than  the 

consent  of  the  heart,  —  binding  us  in  traditionary 
adhesion  to  the  doctrines  of  the  Gospel,  rather 
than  rooting  us  in  that  effectual  belief  through 
which  these  very  doctrines  live,  grow,  and  un 
fold  within  the  soul,  as  principles  to  be  exerted, 
powers  to  be  used,  gifts  and  blessings  to  be 
enjoyed?  How  is  it  that  the  Gospel,  with  the 
system  of  Divinely-appointed  relations  it  dis 
closes,  has  become,  as  to  its  practical  purpose 
and  interest,  so  much  less  to  us  than  to  them  ? 
Can  it  be  that  we  imagine  our  interest  in  it  to 
be  in  any  way  inferior,  and  the  Christ  of  whom 
it  testifies  to  be  in  some  degree  less  ours  than 
theirs  ?  Such  an  inference  might  be  very  nat 
urally  drawn  from  the  way  in  which  we  are 
accustomed  to  speak  of  our^own  position  as 
contrasted  with  that  of  the  Apostles,  primitive 
worthies,  and  even  with  that  occupied  by  the 
saints  under  the  First  Covenant.*  Ordinary 

*  Our  attention  is  frequently  drawn  from  the  pulpit  to  these 
chosen  servants  of  God  about  whom  so  much,  whether  by  way 
of  example  or  of  warning,  has  been  written  for  our  learning;  but 
the  mention  of  them  is  seldom,  I  think,  accompanied  by  a  suf 
ficiently  ample  recognition  of  the  different  position  which  we, 
the  children  of  the  regeneration,  occupy  towards  God,  and  of 
the  fuller  privileges  and  higher  responsibilities  involved  in  it. 
Our  present  day  is  the  day  which  the  prophets,  kings,  and  right 
eous  men  desired  to  see,  and  seeing  but  afar  off,  through  faith, 
were  glad,  —  a  day  whereof  the  prophecy  is  fulfilled,  that  he  who 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  67 

Christians  of  the  present  day  cannot  be  ex 
pected,  we  say,  to  feel  and  act  like  these  emi 
nent  persons.  Yet  who  that  looks  into  this 
matter  by  the  light  of  Scripture  does  not  see 
that  to  be  an  ordinary  Christian,*  a  Christian 
of  the  present  day,  is  to  possess  what  the  elder 
saints  desired,  to  be  placed  where  the  Apostles 
stood  —  in  Christ  —  with  whom  is  neither  after 
nor  before,  neither  beginning  of  time  nor  end 
of  days  ?  What  was  enough  for  the  first  Chris 
tians  will  prove  sufficient  for  the  last,  "  to  be 
found  in  Him,"  without  whom  we  can  do  noth 
ing  ;  and  it  is  certain  (however  vaguely  we  may 
allow  ourselves  to  speak  upon  the  subject)  that 
the  Apostles,  who,  like  us,  neither  possessed 
nor  could  possess  anything  out  of  their  Saviour, 
were  in  the  enjoyment  of  no  one  privilege  which 
we,  who  are  baptized  with  them  by  one  Spirit 
into  one  body,  f  do  not  at  this  moment  enjoy, 
and  must  continue  to  enjoy,  so  long  as  that  body, 
on  the  Spirit's  express  testimony,  "  is  filled  with 
the  fulness  of  Him  that  filleth  all  in  all."  J 

In  point,  therefore,  of  access,  intimacy,  and 
union,  God  has  put  no  difference  between  us 
and  them ;  and  yet  there  is  a  difference,  one 

is  feeble  among  God's  children  reconciled  in  Christ  shall  be  as 
David.     (Zech.  xii.  8.) 
*  Note  F.  f  1  Cor.  xii.  13.  J  Eph.  i.  22,  23. 


68  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

of  which  we  are  deeply  conscious.  If  God  has 
set  us  where  He  set  them,  in  heavenly  places  in 
Christ,  we  know  that  we  do  not  stand  like  them, 
where  He  has  placed  us,  or  possess,  with  them, 
what  He  has  given  us.  Our  actual  position  is 
not,  like  theirs,  identical  with  our  recognized  one  ; 
and  this  we  feel  and  deplore  keenly,  yet  none 
the  less  adapt  ourselves  to  an  order  of  things 
which  we  choose  to  look  upon  as  necessary, 
without  pausing  to  ask  ourselves  a  question 
which  seems  to  arise  very  naturally,  Is  this 
Gospel,  so  little  to  us,  the  same  as  that  which 
was  so  much  to  them  ?  Have  we  received  it  in 
its  integrity,  accepting  that  which  St.  Paul  was 
so  zealous  to  declare,  the  whole  counsel  of  God 
concerning  us  ?  or  have  we  all  this  time  been 
unconsciously  leaving  out  some  part  or  parts  of 
the  great  system  the  revealed  economy  of  Grace 
discloses  ?  It  behooves  us  to  lend  a  deep  atten 
tion  to  these  questions.  Their  practical  impor 
tance  is  incalculable,  for  we  know  that  with  God 
every  means  must  conduce  to  its  appointed  end ; 
nothing  has  been  made  or  designed  by  Him  in 
vain,  and  though  we  cannot  as  yet  discern  the 
whole  of  His  gracious  purpose,  nor  understand 
the  divinely-constructed  machinery  by  which  He 
has  seen  fit  to  accomplish  it,  we  know  enough 
of  His  doings  to  be  aware,  that  to  work  per- 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  69 

fectly  it  must  work  together,*  and  if  any  one 
part  is  left  to  rust  and  stiffen,  its  inaction  will 
necessarily  impede  the  motion  of  the  rest. 

The  essential  difference  between  us  and  the 
Apostles  —  in  other  words,  between  historical 
and  experimental  belief —  appears  to  consist  in 
this,  that,  in  connection  with  the  visible  facts  of 
our  Lord's  history,  they  recognize,  far  more 
fully  and  practically  than  we  do,  a  great  invisi 
ble  fact.  I  mean  the  presence  and  the  power 
of  the  spiritual  agency,  the  dispenser  of  the 
treasury  of  heaven,  to  whom  the  human  soul 
must  be  indebted  for  all  that  it  can  know  or 
can  receive  of  God,  and  through  whose  inward 
working  a  Saviour's  outward  work  is  made 
effectual,  by  being  applied,  appropriated,  and 
brought  home  to  the  individual  heart  and  con 
science. 

The  Gospel  received  in  the  mere  letter  can 
profit  us  no  more  than  the  Law,  but  will  remain, 
like  it,  an  external  rule,  instructing  us  in  many 
things,  but  imparting  nothing ;  its  facts,  received 
as  mere  facts,  and  held  as  such  within  the  mind 
in  suspension,  lie  there  dormant  and  undevel- 

*  It  behooves  us  rightly  to  divide  the  truth,  to  set  it  forth  in  all 
its  features,  to  view  it  in  all  its  bearings,  and  from  every  side ;  for 
every  doctrine  neglected  has  a  fearful  avenging  power,  and  will, 
yea,  and  does,  reassert  itself.  —  R.  A.  SUCKLING. 


70  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

oped.  They  quicken  no  pulsation,  and  exercise 
no  permeating  influence.  Though  they  carry  a 
principle  of  life  within  them,  it  is  one  which 
cannot  germinate  of  its  own  accord,  or  exert  its 
energy,  save  with  the  aid  of  that  Divine  aux 
iliary,  so  often  likened  in  Scripture  to  those 
elemental  influences  —  the  dew,  the  rain,  the 
fire,  the  wind  blowing  where  it  listeth  —  with 
out  whose  co-operation  no  natural  process  can 
be  accomplished.  "It  is  the  Spirit  that  giveth 
life."  Upon  this  point  Scripture  speaks  plainly  ; 
and  even  natural  reason,  if  duly  exercised,  will 
enable  us  to  understand  how  it  is  that  St.  Paul 
declares  that  no  man,  except  through  the  Spirit 
of  God,  can  either  receive  or  know  anything  of 
those  "  things  of  God  "  *  which  it  is  the  pecu 
liar  office  of  that  Spirit  to  impart.  For  knowl 
edge,  whether  its  object  be  / tangible  or  spiritual, 
earthly  or  Divine,  can  only  reach  the  seat  of 
consciousness  within  us,  through  a  medium  an 
swering  to  the  conditions  of  its  peculiar  nature. 
A  natural  object  must  be  apprehended  by  the 
aid  of  the  natural  senses,  an  idea  must  be  recog 
nized  through  the  exertion  of  the  intellect,  a 
spiritual  truth  attained  to  through  the  exercise 
of  a  spiritual  faculty.  In  no  other  way  can 
any  of  these  obtain  that  true  recognition  which 

*  1  Cor.  iii. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  71 

makes  them  really  our  own.  We  shall  all  be 
ready  to  confess  that  no  exertion  of  the  intel 
lect  can  realize,  no  description,  however  accu 
rate,  convey,  the  true  idea  of  a  color,  an  odor, 
a  sound,  a  flavor.  To  know  what  these  things 
are,  we  must  have  seen,  smelt,  heard,  and  tasted 
them;  and  as  with  natural  so  with  spiritual 
things.  Here,  also,  we  must  "  taste  and  see  "  ; 
taste  before  we  see,  taste  in  order  to  see.  Our 
very  perception  must  partake  of  the  nature  of 
experience,  as  all  that  wre  can  gain  otherwise  is 
but  vague  and  conjectural,  —  a  notion  about  the 
thing,  not  the  knowledge  of  it. 

The  Apostles  speak  as  men  who  have  learnt 
the  full  force  of  this  distinction ;  and  we  never 
find  them  confounding  things  natural  and  spirit 
ual  with  each  other,  or  expecting  to  arrive  at 
the  understanding  of  the  latter  by  means  of  any 
natural  faculty  or  intellectual  process.  They 
know  that  through  the  seeing  eye  and  the  hear 
ing  ear  man  is  placed  in  communication  with 
the  outward  world  of  sense  ;  they  are  aware, 
that  through  the  conceptions  of  his  heart  and 
mind  he  can  hold  communion  with  the  inner 
world  of  thought  and  of  feeling,  —  those  "  things 
of  a  man  "  which,  as  St.  Paul  testifies,  each  man 
can  realize  through  an  exertion  of  his  own.  self- 
consciousness  ;  but  when  it  is  "  the  things  of 


72  A  PRESENT  IIEA  YEN. 

God  "  that  are  in  question,  they  rely  no  longer 
upon  the  natural  faculties  and  powers,  knowing 
that  these  are  only  to  be  searched  out  by  "  the 
spirit  that  is  in  man,  and  through  the  inspiration 
of  the  Almighty  that  giveth  understanding." 

It  is  through  this  unction  from  the  Holy  One 
that  they  know  all  things ;  and  it  is  somewhat 
remarkable  that  we  never  find  the  Apostles 
grounding  their  confidence  upon  a  privilege  to 
which  we  are  often  disposed  to  attribute  it,  —  I 
mean  the  fact  of  their  having  known  our  Saviour 
in  His  human  person.  To  those  who  are  con 
scious  of  possessing  their  Lord,  it  is  little  merely 
to  have  seen  Him ;  and  with  them  the  external 
view  is  so  merged  in  the  sense  of  inward  reali 
zation,  that  St.  Paul,  in  describing  the  intimacy 
and  fulness  of  the  life  in  which  all  things  are 
made  new,  exclaims,  "  Yea,  though  we  have 
known  Christ  after  the  flesh,  yet  now  henceforth 
know  we  Him  no  more."  To  understand  the 
bearing  of  these  memorable  words,  we  must 
drink  so  deeply  into  the  spirit  in  which  they  are 
uttered,  as  to  be  able  to  meet  their  speaker  in 
his  explicit  statement,  that  no  man  can  say  (in  a 
saving  and  effectual  sense)  "  that  Jesus  is  the 
Lord  but  by  the  Holy  Ghost "  ;  and  this,  be 
cause  any  acknowledgment  of  Him  that  rests 
on  merely  outward  evidence  must  necessarily 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  73 

fall  far  short  of  that  good  confession,  for  the 
utterance  of  which  St.  Peter's  Master  pro 
nounced  him  blessed.  That,  on  the  Master's 
own  testimony,  was  the  expression  of  a  deep 
inward  conviction  wrought  by  God  Himself 
upon  the  soul ;  and  it  was  not  because  Christ 
had  been  manifested  to  St.  Peter  in  the  flesh, 
but  because  He  had  been  revealed  to  him  in  the 
Spirit,  that  he  was  able  to  answer  our  Lord's 
question,  "  Whom  sayest  thou  that  I  am  ?  "  *  in 
the  words  which  drew  forth  this  comment : 
"  Blessed  art  thou,  Simon  Bar-jona,  for  flesh 
and  blood  hath  not  revealed  it  unto  thee,  but 
my  Father  which  is  in  heaven."  Now  it  is 
evident,  upon  the  warrant  of  these  words,  that 
the  Apostles,  to  whom  we  ascribe  so  many  supe 
rior  advantages,  were  exactly  in  our  own  posi 
tion  in  this  one  respect,  that  they  could  know 
nothing  except  they  received  it  from  heaven,  — 
could  learn  nothing  truly,  even  of  Him  whose 
words  they  listened  to,  and  whose  steps  they 
followed  in,  except  they  were  taught  it  of  God. 
Without  a  spiritual  enlightenment,  even  when 
they  looked  upon  their  Lord,  their  eyes  were 
holden  that  they  should  not  know  Him  ;  without 
a  spiritual  approximation,  even  when  they  sat 
with  Him  in  the  house,  and  walked  with  Him  in 

*  Matt.  xvi.  15. 


74  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

the  way,  they  were  not  really  nigh  Him.  Their 
need  was  as  great  as  is  ours  of  that  inner  illu 
mination,  that  internal  contact,  without  which  it 
would  have  availed  them  little  that  they  had 
seen  with  their  eyes,  and  handled  with  their 
hands,  of  the  Word  of  life ;  for  all  this  might 
have  been,  and  yet  have  left  them  without  that 
knowledge  of  a  Saviour  which  is  life  and 
peace,  —  have  left  them,  too,  among  the  number 
of  those  to  whom,  after  having  lived  in  their 
presence,  and  taught  in  their  streets,  He  will 
none  the  less  one  day  profess,  —  "I  never  knew 
you." 

For  it  was  not  every  one  who  saw  our  Lord 
upon  earth  that  saw,  with  righteous  Simeon,  His 
salvation.  While  many  thronged  and  pressed 
upon  Him  in  the  crowd,  few  really  touched  Him  ; 
and  the  Scriptures  make  it  evident,  that  among 
the  multitudes  who  witnessed  His  mighty  and 
merciful  deeds,  were  many  persons  "who  seeing 
did  not  understand,"  and  remained  in  a  state  of 
unbelief  not  to  be  overcome  by  any  outward 
testimony,  even  that  of  a  miracle.  Yet  because 
they  saw  his  works,  and  in  some  cases  were 
themselves  the  subjects  of  them,  they  must 
have  believed  in  them,  as  matters  of  fact,  and 
must  also,  on  the  evidence  of  such  facts,  have 
believed  in  Him,  as  a  Being  endowed  with  won- 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  75 

derful  and  superhuman  powers.  How  then  was 
it  that  they  did  not,  at  the  same  time,  believe  to 
the  savino;  of  their  souls  ?  The  answer  to  this 

O 

will  go  far  to  explain  to  us  how  it  is  that  so 
many  among  us  believe,  and  in  a  certain  sense 
understand  our  Bibles,  yet,  for  want  of  a  spir 
itual  insight  and  appropriation,  fail,  while  we 
accept  the  fact,  to  receive  along  with  it  the  life- 
imparting  principle  it  encloses.  What  the  Word 
spoken  (whether  by  word  or  sign)  was  to  them, 
the  Word  written  is  to  us,  and  neither  can  profit, 
so  long  as  it  is  received  in  the  word  only.  They 
had  the  fact,  and  we  have  its  record ;  and  either, 
to  be  made  effectual  to  the  heart  and  conscience 
of  any  one  of  us,  requires  to  be  brought  home 
to  that  heart  and  conscience,  by  the  Spirit  of 
demonstration  and  of  power. 

We  love  our  Bibles,  and  we  think  that  we 
believe  them  :  let  us  ask  ourselves  this  question, 
Can  persons  believe  the  Bible  who  do  not  be 
lieve  what  the  Bible  tells  them?  In  other 
words,  Can  they  believe  the  Bible  who  do  not  be 
lieve  in  anything  else?  For  while  we  rest  in 
the  Bible,  to  the  exclusion  of  any  other  testi 
mony,  the  Bible  itself  declares  most  solemnly 
in  favor  of  another  Witness,  to  whom  it  appeals 
as  an  evidence  of  its  own  truth ;  and  if  we 
believe  what  the  Apostles,  speaking  through  the 


76  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

Gospel,  tell  us,  we  must  also  accept  the  authority 
to  which  they  refer  us,  and  to  which  they  were 
referred  by  their  Lord :  "  When  the  Comforter 
is  come,  whom  I  will  send  unto  you  from  the 
Father,  even  the  Spirit  of  truth,  which  pro- 
ceedeth  from  the  Father,  He  shall  testify  of  me. 
For  He  shall  receive  of  mine,  and  shall  show  it 
unto  you."  Now,  if  they  who  had  been  with 
their  Master  from  the  beginning,  who  were 
themselves  appointed  to  be  His  historic  wit 
nesses,  had  yet  need  of  a  spiritual  Witness, 
upon  whose  evidence  and  through  whose  spirit 
ual  monitions  they  were  to  receive  their  Lord 
more  fully,  and  learn  of  Him  more  truly  than 
they  had  yet  done,  how  can  we  afford  to  dis 
pense  with  its  testimony  ?  If  the  facts  were 
not  enough  for  them,  how  shall  the  record  of 
the  facts  be  enough  for  us  ?  "  It  is  the  Spirit 
that  beareth  Witness  "  ;  and  so  long  as  Belief 
is  based,  as  might  have  been  with  the  Apostles, 
on  the  evidence  of  the  senses,  or  rests,  as  in 
the  case  of  so  many  among  ourselves,  upon  the 
written  testimony  of  others,  we  are  but  receiv 
ing  the  Witness  of  men,  the  Witness  of  God 
being  greater  :  "  And  he  that  belie veth  hath  the 
Witness  in  himself." 

Here,  then,  we  find  the  point  of  departure 

*  John  xv.  and  xvi. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  77 

between  us  and  the  Apostles.  Our  belief,  com 
pared  with  theirs,  is  dead,  formal,  and  historical, 
because  they  have  attained  to  what  we  too  often 
miss,  —  a  point  of  union  between  the  work 
done  and  the  work  doing.  While  they  rest  in 
Christ's  work,  they  rejoice  in  the  Spirit's  work, 
which  is  unto  them  the  seal  of  its  perfect  ac 
complishment  in  their  hearts,  —  the  earnest  of 
grace,  and  the  promise  of  glory.  To  them,  the 
Word  spoken  from  Heaven  has  been  answered 
by  the  work  wrought  through  its  efficacy  upon 
earth  ;  they  have  found  all  the  promises  of  God 
in  Christ  Yea,  and  in  Him  Amen.  Nothing 
has  been  declared  which  has  not  also  been  con 
firmed.  To  the  Yea  of  God  — the  let  it  be, 
and  it  was  —  spoken  in  our  Saviour's  accom 
plished  work  of  deliverance,  of  which,  upon  the 
Cross,  He  testified  that  it  was  finished,  the 
Amen  —  so  let  it  be  —  has  been  returned  from 
the  faithful  soul,  bearing  witness  to  the  salvation 
wrought  within  it  through  the  power  of  the 
Yea.  Therefore,  while  we  are  all  doubt  and 
hesitation,  not  knowing  whether  or  not  we  may 
appropriate  this  privilege  or  claim  this  promise, 
the  Apostles  use  the  language  of  men  who  know 
the  certainty  of  the  things  wherein  they  have 
been  instructed.  What  they  have  seen  and 
heard  is  their  guaranty,  as  the  Bible  is  ours, 


78  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

for  the  facts  upon  which  their  relations  with 
God  are  founded  ;  and  when  they  pass  from 
these  facts  to  their  application  to  the  individual 
soul,  we  find  them  no  less  confident,  and  this 
because  they  have  received  not  only  gifts,  but 
with  them  that  which  seems,  in  the  case  of  any 
intelligent  Being,  essential  to  the  true  possession 
and  use  of  them  ;  I  mean  the  knowledge  that 
they  are  our  own.  "  We  have  received,"  says 
St.  Paul,*  "  of  the  Spirit  to  know  the  things 
which  have  been  freely  given  us  of  God  "  ;  and 
St.  John  testifies  for  himself  and  his  converts,! 
that  "  an  understanding  has  been  given  them 
both  to  know  Him  that  is  true,  and  they  that 
are  in  Him  that  is  true." 

As  He  that  beareth  record  is  true,  so  is  He 
that  beareth  witness  true  also  ;  and  having  re 
ceived  the  faithful  and  true  Witness,  God's 
testimony  to  His  own  Work,  they  would  as 
soon  think  of  doubting  that  which  they  had 
seen,  the  fact  of  our  Lord's  personal  existence, 
as  of  doubting  that  which  they  have  felt,  their 
own  personal  interest  in  Him  ;  they  would  as 
soon  think  of  calling  their  Saviour's  merits  in 
question,  as  of  hesitating  with  regard  to  their 
own  participation  in  them.  That  they  are  in 
Him,  is  a  fact  as  clearly  established  as  that  He 

*  1  Cor.  ii.  12.  f  1  John  v.  20. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  79 

is  ;  and  this  confidence  has  not  been  brought 
about,  as  we  sometimes  imagine,  both  as  regards 
them  and  other  eminent  Christians,  by  way  of 
any  extraordinary  Revelation,  but  is  founded 
upon  the  evidence  which,  in  the  case  of  any 
merely  natural  event,  we  should  esteem  at  once 
the  simplest  and  the  surest,  —  they  know  that 
the  Work  is  wrought  for  and  in  them,  simply 
because  they  experience  its  effects  ;  they  feel 
that  something  has  been  brought  about  within 
their  souls  which  could  not  have  been  accom 
plished  but  by  the  presence  of  a  power,  the 
influence  of  an  agency.  Being  conscious  that 
it  is  not  with  them  as  it  has  been,  they  compare 
the  affections,  tempers,  and  desires  they  now 
experience  with  those  which  had  possession  of 
them  while  they  yet  walked  in  the  darkness  of 
the  natural  understanding ;  they  rest,  in  short, 
in  a  felt  and  experienced  work. 

And  here  I  would  draw  attention  to  another 
deeply  interesting  fact,  and  wish  to  do  so  the 
more  particularly,  because  when  a  view,  how 
ever  scriptural,  fails  to  obtain  general  reception, 
it  is  usual  to  charge  it  with  being  unreal,  vision 
ary,  tending  to  no  practical  issue.  It  becomes, 
therefore,  very  important  for  us  to  observe  that 
the  Apostles,  boldly  as  they  speak  for  themselves 
and  the  Churches  to  which  they  ministered, 


80  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

of  conscious  possessing,  conscious  partaking  of 
Christ,  never  rest  this  possession  and  partaking 
upon  sensations,  impressions,  visions,  or  revela 
tions  of  the  Lord  (abundantly  as  in  these  last 
respects  they  had  whereof  to  glory),  but  ground 
it  upon  the  turning  of  the  heart  to  God,*  as 
evidenced  in  a  renewed  affection,  a  moral  reno 
vation,  a  spiritual  change.  They  know  that 

*  Few  Christians  appear  to  have  enjoyed  such  abounding,  even 
overwhelming,  manifestations  of  the  Divine  presence  and  favor, 
as  fell  to  the  share  of  the  heavenly-hearted  Brainerd.  In  youth 
he  would  pass  whole  days  in  the  wild  solitudes  of  the  forest,  in  a 
state  of  ecstasy,  in  which  he  was  insensible  to  the  flight  of  time, 
to  hunger,  and  every  impression  of  an  outward  kind,  and  during 
the  whole  course  of  his  ardent  evangelic  life,  there  were  seasons, 
not  unfrequent,  of  which,  through  the  abundance  of  the  revela 
tions,  he  might  have  said,  with  the  Apostle,  that  whether  they 
were  passed  in  the  body,  or  out  of  the  body,  was  known  not  to 
him,  but  God.  Yet  it  is  recorded  that,  "  There  was  no  sight  of 
heaven  in  his  imagination,  with  gates  of  pearl  and  golden  streets, 
and  a  vast  multitude  with  shining  garments ;  no  vision  of  the 
book  of  life  opened  with  his  name  written  in  it:  no  sudden  sug 
gestion  of  words  or  promise  of  Scripture,  as  then  immediately 
spoken  or  sent  to  him,  no  new  revelations,  or  strong  suggestions 
of  secret  facts.  But  the  way  he  was  satisfied  of  his  own  good 
estate  was  by  feeling  within  himself  the  lively  actings  of  a  holy 
temper  and  heavenly  disposition,  the  vigorous  exercise  of  that 
divine  love  which  casts  out  fear."  Also,  on  the  subject  of  his 
missionary  labors,  he  says :  "  I  look  upon  it  as  one  of  the  glories 
of  this  work  of  grace  among  the  Indians,  and  a  special  evidence 
of  its  being  from  a  Divine  influence,  that  there  has  been  till  now 
no  visionary  notions,  trances,  and  imaginations  intermixed  with 
those  rational  convictions  of  sin,  and  solid  consolations  which 
numbers  have  experienced,  and  might  I  have  had  my  desire,  there 
had  been  no  appearance  of  anything  of  this  nature  at  aU" 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  81 

they  are  Christ's  by  the  Spirit  which  He  has 
given  them,  —  a  Spirit  which,  being  like  unto 
His  own,  works  in  their  spirits  a  holy  like- 
mindedness  with  their  Lord.  Without  this, 
they  might  possess  all  gifts,  and  understand  all 
mysteries,  and  yet  be  nothing.  St.  Paul's  ex 
perience  works  hope,  and  he  knows  that  this  is 
a  sure  and  certain  hope,  a  hope  that  maketh  not 
ashamed,  not  because  he  has  been  caught  up 
into  the  third  heaven,  and  heard  in  paradise 
unspeakable  words  not  lawful  for  a  man  to  utter, 
but  because  the  love  of  God  is  shed  abroad  in 
his  heart  by  the  Holy  Ghost.*  St.  John  knows 
that  he  has  passed  from  death  unto  life,  not 
because,  being  in  the  Spirit,  he  has  seen  and 
talked  with  angels  and  with  One  greater  than 
they,  but  because  he  loves  the  brethren. f  And 
just  as  in  our  Lord's  outward  ministry  of  Re 
demption,  the  works  that  He  did  bore  witness 
of  Him  that  God  had  sent  Him,  so  in  His  inner 
ministry  of  Sanctification  do  signs  and  wonders 
accompany  them  that  believe.  And,  as  in  the 
case  of  our  Saviour's  miracles,  the  work  of 
power  bore  witness  to  the  presence  of  power, 
so  is  the  presence  of  grace  attested  by  the  work 
of  grace.  In  each  case  an  appeal  is  made  to 
something  accomplished  —  evident  —  to  be  seen 

*  Rom.  v.  5.  f  1  John  iii.  14. 

4*  F 


82  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

and  known  of  all  men.  The  Spirit  as  well  as 
the  Word  says,  "  Believe  that  I  am  He,  for  the 
very  works'  sake,"  for  the  sake  and  on  the  testi 
mony  of  love,  peace,  righteousness,  and  joy  in 
the  Holy  Ghost.  My  works  —  in  their  way  as 
manifest  as  the  works  of  the  flesh  which  they 
displace.  "  If  I  do  not  the  works  which  none 
other  can  do,  believe  not  that  God  hath  sent 
me." 

It  is  the  peculiar  mission  of  the  Holy  Spirit 
to  lead  us  into  the  knowledge  and  certainty  of 
our  happy  estate  in  Christ,  —  a  mission  on  which 
His  name  of  Comforter  seems  founded.  "  In 
that  day,"  says  our  Lord,  speaking  of  the  com 
ing  of  Him  for  whose  sake  it  was  expedient 
that  He  himself  should  leave  us,  "ye  shall  know 
that  I  am  in  the  Father,  and  ye  in  me,  and  I  in 
you  "  ;  *  and  I  think  it  is  greatly  because  we  do 
not  strive  after  the  realization  of  this  promise, 
and  seem,  indeed  (speaking  generally),  to  have 
resigned  even  the  expectation  of  its  fulfilment 
within  us,  that  our  religion  has  become  a  heart 
less,  unreal  thing,  without  grasp  upon  the  truths 
it  professes  to  embrace. 

I  know  that  to  speak  of  things  heavenly,  just 
as  we  should  do  of  things  earthly,  on  the  ground 
of  simple  experience  ;  to  testify  to  a  Saviour's 

*  John  xiv.  20. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  83 

love  as  something  which  has  been  felt ;  to  re 
joice  in  conscious  pardon,  conscious  renewal, 
conscious  acceptance  in  the  Beloved,  is  to  trans 
gress  the  limits  of  that  conventional  acceptation 
of  the  Gospel  to  which  Christians  are  satisfied 
to  restrict  themselves.  Such  views,  it  is  said, 
are  likely  to  lead  to  error  and  self-deception. 
In  short,  they  are  dangerous,  —  a  word  which, 
being  used  for  the  purpose  of  dismissing  the 
subject  summarily,  is  not  accustomed  to  wait 
for  an  answer,  or  one  might  be  readily  found 
for  it  in  the  fact,  that  there  is  no  one  doctrine 
of  the  Gospel,  not  even  excepting  those  which 
are  most  essential  to  salvation,  which  may  not 
prove,  and  has  not  proved,  dangerous,  when 
forced  into  undue  prominence,  by  being  taken 
in  isolation  from  other  truths  of  kindred  impor 
tance.  Besides,  in  this  case  we  are  not  the 
judges.  An  inquiry  raised  upon  any  point  upon 
which  God  has  been  pleased  to  reveal  Himself 
in  the  inspired  Word,  must  not  proceed  upon 
merely  prudential  grounds.  The  question  is  not, 
Is  this  (according  to  our  own  notions)  a  safe 
view  of  the  subject  ?  but,  Is  it  the  scriptural, 
the  true  one  ?  Can  we  deny  it  without  depriv 
ing  a  large  portion  of  Scripture  of  its  meaning 
and  coherency,  or  ignore  it  without  numbering 
ourselves  among  those  who  handle  the  Word  of 


84  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

God  deceitfully,  and  draw  on  themselves  a  real 
danger,  even  the  judgment  pronounced  against 
those  who  "  diminish  aught "  from  His  invio 
lable  testimonies  ?  I  do  not  —  understand  me 
well  —  mean  to  say,  that  faith,  in  order  to  be 
sincere  and  saving,  must  necessarily  reach  the 
measure  of  the  confidence  I  have  been  speaking 
of.  The  song  of  holy  trust  and  triumph  in 
God,  which  none  but  the  redeemed  can  learn, 
is  most  truly  "  a  song  of  degrees  "  ;  and  a  faith 
which  effectually  secures  participation  in  the 
merits  of  our  Lord  may  yet  come  short  of  the 
faith  which  assures  of  that  participation.  I 
would  only  urge,  that  this  clearer  perception 
should,  upon  the  testimony  of  Scripture,  be 
believed  in  as  a  possible  attainment,  and  then 
prayed  for,  striven  for,  lived  for ;  for  the  holy 
gift  of  assurance  is  the  reward,  as  an  old  divine 
expresses  it,  of  "  exact  walking  "  :  it  is  a  treas 
ure  imparted  only  to  those  who  keep  faithfully 
the  good  things  committed  to  their  charge.  It 
is  God's  usury  upon  His  own  money. 

We  should  at  least,  as  you  say  to  me  in  one 
of  your  letters,  expect  the  fulfilment  of  our  Re 
deemer's  so  often  repeated  promise,  —  the  reward 
of  faith  and  obedience,*  —  that  He  would  mani- 

*  Our  Lord's  answer  to  the  question  of  Judas  (John  xiv.  22,  23), 
taken  with  the  many  other  sayings  in  which  He  makes  the  abid- 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  85 

fest  Himself  to  His  people  after  another  manner 
than  He  does  unto  the  world.  Believing  this 
promise,  should  we  not  be  urgent  after  its  ac 
complishment,  in  that  spiritual  revelation  of 
Christ,  which  is  to  the  faithful  soul  the  perform 
ance  of  the  things  in  which  it  has  believed  on 
the  evidence  of  the  outward  word  ?  As  no 
man  knoweth  the  Father  but  the  Son,  and  he 
to  whom  the  Son  will  reveal  Him,  should  we 
not  pray  that  the  Father  may  in  the  Son  be 
manifested  towards  us  more  and  more,  as  noth 
ing  short  of  the  sweetness  of  such  a  disclosure 
can  engage  our  hearts  to  love  and  serve  Him 
with  that  perfect  love  which  casteth  out  fear,* 

ing  in  His  love,  and  in  that  of  the  Father,  dependent  on  the  keep 
ing  of  the  commandment,  places  obedience  before  us  in  a  light  in 
which,  I  think,  we  have  need  to  consider  it  more  fully  than  has 
been  yet  done.  I  mean  as  being  a  direct  means  of  grace,  a  way 
wherein,  as  by  prayer  and  the  other  divinely-appointed  ordi 
nances,  we  approach  unto  God,  and  draw  out  our  souls  after 
Him ;  as  a  tree,  while  it  lives  by  its  root,  breathes  and  feeds  it 
self  through  every  leaf  which  the  root  nourishes.  Many  disputes 
have  been  raised  among  men  as  to  the  difference  between  faith 
and  obedience.  It  is  probable  they  are  identical  with  God,  to 
whom  obedience,  that  part  of  our  life  in  Him  which  is  seen,  and 
faith,  the  part  which  is  unseen,  are  alike  open  and  manifest.  It 
is  evident  that  an  action  performed  or  refrained  from,  with  a  ref 
erence  to  the  Divine  pleasure,  is  as  eloquent  unto  God  as  a  prayer 
or  thanksgiving,  and  as  likely  to  be  answered  by  Him  with  bless 
ing.  For  to  the  eye  of  love,  the  deeds  and  gestures  that  express 
it  are  as  intelligible  as  its  spoken  words,  and  no  less  acceptable 
and  sweet. 
*  St.  Bernard. 


8G  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

"  which  feels  not  the  burden  of  the  day,  which 
counts  not  the  cost  of  the  labor,  which  works 
not  for  wages,  being  itself  the  most  powerful 
motive  of  action  "  ?  And  in  urging  these  ques 
tions,  I  am  less  occupied  with  what  I  believe  to 
be  necessary  to  the  salvation  of  our  souls,  than 
with  what  I  know  to  be  essential  *  to  their  com 
fort.  It  is  upon  the  Saviour's  work,  and  not 
upon  the  Spirit's  witness,  that  salvation  depends. 
Yet  they  are  the  happiest  Christians  who,  while 
they  rest  in  the  Day  of  Redemption,  rejoice  in 
that  whereby  they  are  sealed  unto  it,  with  joy 
unspeakable  and  full  of  glory.  For  without  the 
witness  of  the  Comforter  we  can  know  nothing 
of  love,  and  joy,  and  peace  in  believing,  as 
these  happy  and  holy  affections  depend  for  their 
existence  and  support  upon  evidence  which  it  is 
His  office  to  impart.  Without  the  security  which 
this  communicates,  there  can  be  no  sweetness  in 
love,  no  foundation  for  joy,  no  possibility  of 
peace  ;  and  until  we  receive  this  witness  we 
must  live,  as  so  many  of  us  are  content  to  do, 
a  starved  life,  joyless,  unloving,  unassured,  as 
unworthy  of  the  privileges  in  which  Christianity 
places  us,  as  it  is  of  the  glorious  prospects  to 
which,  on  the  warrant  of  those  privileges,  it 
conducts  us.  "To  them  that  believe,  Christ  is 

*  See  Note  G. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  87 

precious."  How  comes  it,  then,  that  we  are 
content  to  rest  the  great  matter  of  our  personal 
interest  in  Him  upon  evidence  that  would  not 
satisfy  us  in  the  case  of  any  temporal  possession, 
—  far  less  so  in  that  of  any  earthly  affection, — 
content  to  remain  without  the  tokens  of  His 
presence,  without  the  marks  of  His  love,  with 
out  the  consciousness  of  His  indwelling  and 
abiding  ?  *  Christ  has  given  Himself  for  us, 

*  To  return  again  to  this  saying,  "  If  a  man  love  me,  he  will 
keep  my  words,  and  my  Father  will  love  him;  and  we  will 
come  unto  him,  and  make  our  abode  with  him,"  —  do  they  not 
attach  an  unspeakable  present  reward  to  faith  and  obedience,  a 
prize  only  to  be  attained  through  their  joint  exercise,  though 
freedom  and  acceptance  may  be  won,  as  by  the  thief  on  the  cross, 
through  faith  alone  ?  Well  may  this  be  called  the  prize  of  our 
high  calling,  if  it  were  possible  to  express  in  words  what  that 
prize  is,  —  what  that  promised  manifestation,  —  what  that  habitual 
indwelling,  —  we  might  hope  to  win  more  of  our  fellow-creatures 
to  strive  for  it ;  but  it  is  among  the  things  which  it  is  not  lawful 
(possible?)  for  a  man  to  utter.  There  is  something  in  this  which 
words  —  even  though,  like  these  of  Christ's,  they  be  spirit  and 
they  be  life  —  can  never  fully  express.  It  is  a  revelation  made 
by  degrees  to  those  who  seek  it,  by  a  close  and  humble  walk 
with  God,  in  praver  and  in  the  keeping  of  the  commandment. 
Many  sincere  Christians,  doubtless,  fall  short  of  it.  Many,  in 
deed,  know  not  that  there  is  such  a  prize,  and  have  but  faint  per 
ceptions  of  anything  to  be  striven  for  beyond  what  they  already 
possess.  It  seems  to  me  that  there  is  a  treasure  hid  in  such  say 
ings  as  these,  "  I  will  manifest  myself  unto  him,"  "  we  will  make 
our  abode  with  him,"  which  few  among  us  even  guess  at.  We 
read  the  words  as  we  might  walk  over  the  turf  under  which  there 
is  hidden  gold.  It  is  a  great  matter,  however,  to  have  been  made 
aware  of  the  existence  of  the  treasure,  though  we  may  as  yet 
have  made  small  way  towards  taking  possession  of  it.  —  J.  E.  B. 


88  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

yet  we  do  not  know  whether  He  is  our  own  or 
not,  and  we  are  content  to  remain  in  uncer 
tainty.  Yet  the  Good  Shepherd,  speaking  of 
the  sheep  for  whom  He  laid  down  His  life, 
and  for  whom  He  has  taken  it  again,  says,  "  I 
know  my  sheep,  and  am  known  of  mine,"  —  the 
Church,  for  which  Christ  died,  and  for  and  in 
which  He  even  now  liveth,  has  One  within  her 
that  uses  no  hesitating  language.  The  Spirit 
has  spoken  for  the  Bride,  "  My  beloved  is  mine, 
and  I  am  His."  Where  there  is  uncertainty, 
there  will  be  all  that  coldness  and  indecision 
which  has  rendered  the  epithet  of  the  Saxon 
king,  "  the  Unready,"  so  mournfully  appropriate 
to  Christians  in  general.  We  are  weighing  our 
claims  when  we  ought  to  be  urging  them,  prov 
ing  our  armor  when  we  ought  to  be  fighting  in 
it,  seeking  our  Lord,  when  firmer,  truer  spirits 
would  be  saying,  "  I  have  found  Him  whom  my 
soul  loveth,"  and  this  because  we  have  not  been 
careful  to  pierce  into  the  blessedness  of  that 
"  mystery  "  of  devout  consolation,  without  which 
prayer  sinks  into  an  exercise,  obedience  into 
taskwork,  and  the  sacraments  are  degraded  into 
a  symbol,  —  Christ  in  us,  the  Hope  of  glory. 

And  if  Christ  be  indeed  within  us,  if  we 
are  truly  among  the  number  of  those  who  love 
His  appearing,  we  shall  not  long  remain  without 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  89 

a  sign  of  it ;  it  being  as  natural  for  Him  to  im 
part  an  evidence  of  His  favor,  as  it  is  for  the 
human  soul  to  require  it.  "  What  sign  showest 
Thou  ?  "  the  Jews  asked  of  Him  upon  earth,  a 
question  only  made  objectionable  through  the 
cavilling  spirit  in  which  it  was  uttered,  for  it  is 
necessary  to  the  mind  of  Man,  and  a  part  of  its 
reasonable  nature,  to  seek  to  establish  itself  in 
the  certainty  of  whatever  it  would  fain  confide 
in  as  true,  or  rest  in  as  desirable.  Wherever 
interest  may  be  excited  or  affection  awakened,  it 
will  demand  some  evidence,  suitable  to  the  nature 
of  the  object  concerned,  to  show  that  the  affec 
tion  is  reciprocated,  the  interest  assured ;  and  I 
think  in  the  case  of  our  dearest  interests  we  are 
much  the  losers,  by  not  acting  as  simply  as  we 
should  do  in  any  affair  of  common  life,  and  seek 
ing  for  the  proof  of  our  acceptance  with  God, 
exactly  where  God  has  bid  us  look  for  it.  No 
man,  says  our  Lord  Himself,  can  do  the  works 
of  God,  except  God  be  with  him ;  and  His 
Apostle  *  repeats  the  same  truth  in  another 
form  of  words  when  he  makes  the  keeping  of 
the  commandment  a  signf  unto  ourselves,  an 

*  And  hereby  we  do  know  that  we  know  Him,  if  we  keep  His 

commandments Whoso  keepeth  His  word,  in  him  verily 

is  the  love  of  God  perfected ;  hereby  know  we  that  we  are  in  Him. 
(1  John  ii.  3,  5.) 

f  A  sign  so  sure,  so  deeply  satisfactory  in  its  nature,  that  I 


90  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

evidence  of  our  standing  in  that  grace  through 
which  alone  it  can  be  performed.  While  some, 
therefore,  altogether  ignore  the  witness  of  the 
Spirit,  and  others  place  it  in  something  vague 
and  intangible,  an  enthusiastic  feeling,  an  ele 
vated  impression,  which  they  are  dissatisfied  if 
they  do  not  find,  and  finding,  scarcely  know 
whether  this  is  indeed  what  they  have  sought 
or  not,  the  testimony  of  God  stands  sure  where 
He  has  placed  it.  In  the  witness  of  affiliation, 

sometimes  find  it  hard  to  understand  why  we  should  ask  for  any 
other.  1  feel  a  sort  of  surprise  in  hearing  Christians  expressing 
a  desire  for  the  restoration  of  the  Church's  miraculous  gifts,  or 
wishing,  as  individuals,  for  visible  answers  to  prayer,  or  other 
sensible  consolations  of  the  Spirit.  It  seems  so  plain,  that  the 
remaining  faithful  to  Divine  grace  in  that  which  is  least  —  say 
in  being  able  to  maintain  a  truly  loving  temper  under  unjust 
provocation —  is  a  fuller,  more  intimate  evidence  of  continuance 
in  God's  love,  than  would  be  shown  in  the  power  of  raising  a 
dead  body  to  life,  or  even  in  that  more  coveted  power  of  being 
employed  by  God  to  raise  up  a  dead  soul.  "  For  rejoice  not  that 
the  spirits  are  made  subject  unto  you,  but  rejoice  rather  that 
your  names  are  written  in  Heaven."  Let  us  rejoice  in  that  we 
are  accepted  and  renewed  in  Christ,  who  has  also  given  us  the 
earnest  of  His  Spirit,  making  us  of  one  heart,  one  way  with  Him, 
to  show  us  that  we  are  indeed  His. 

Covet  earnestly  the  best  gifts.  The  passive  graces,  patience, 
meekness,  self-abnegation,  these  are  the  miracles  of  the  New  Cov 
enant.  While  many  of  the  active  virtues  are  merely  the  natural 
energies  transfigured  and  changed  into  a  higher  likeness,  —  the 
earthly  made  to  bear  the  image  of  the  heavenly,  —  these  are  most 
trulv 

"  Unfed  by  Nature's  soil." 

Their  root  itself  is  in  Christ,  and  in  Him  is  their  fruit  found. 


A  PRESENT  PIE  A  YEN.  91 

given  in  the  Spirit  of  grace  and  of  adoption, 
whereby,  in  the  conversion  of  the  heart  unto 
God,  we  cry  unto  Him,  Abba,  Father ;  in  the 
witness  of  assimilation,  given  in  the  mind  re 
newed  after  Christ's  likeness,  in  righteousness 
and  true  holiness,  after  the  Image  in  which  it 
was  first  created. 

And  here  I  might  quit  a  subject  which  it  is 
impossible  to  exhaust,  were  it  not  that  I  desire 
to  explain  myself  more  fully  upon  a  point  con 
nected  with  it,  upon  which,  as  yet,  I  have  only 
touched  incidentally.  I  feel  that  few  Christians 
will  agree  in  what  I  have  said,  upon  our  equality 
with  the  Apostles  in  respect  of  privileges  and 
capabilities  in  Christ,  and  we  are  slow  to  believe 
in  this  equality,  or  to  admit  the  scriptural  infer 
ences  on  which  it  is  founded,  from  a  disposition, 
very  common,  I  think,  among  us,  to  look  upon 
the  extraordinary  gifts  of  the  Spirit  as  being 
something  greater  and  more  Godlike  than  its 
ordinary  graces :  yet  it  does  not  require  a  very 
deep  examination  of  Scripture  *  to  prove  that 
the  sanctifying  grace  still  enjoyed  by  the  Church, 
and  which  can  never  depart  from  it,  is  a  richer 

*  We  see  that  the  disciples  of  our  Lord  had  received  from  Him 
wonder-working  powers  at  a  time  when  St.  John  expressly  tells 
us  (chap.  vii.  39)  that  the  Holy  Ghost  was  not  yet  given.  Yet 
the  Seventy  could  then  return  with  joy,  declaring  that  the  devils 
•were  subject  to  them.  Compare  also  with  this  the  twelfth  chapter 


92  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

and  more  heavenly  gift,  containing  in  it  a  fuller 
participation  in  the  Divine  nature,  than  the  mi 
raculous  gifts  granted  to  the  Apostles,  in  order 
to  promote  its  first  establishment.  For  it  is  evi 
dent  that  these  last  may  be  possessed,  as  in  the 
case  of  Balaam,  and  many  other  persons  in 
stanced  in  the  Old  and  New  Testaments,  with 
out  that  vital  union  of  the  soul  with  its  Maker 
which  is  essential  to  the  communication  of  the 
latter.  Balaam  saw  the  vision  of  the  Almighty, 
and  beheld  the  star  arising  out  of  Jacob,  but  the 
Day-star,  as  Edwards  *  observes,  never  arose  in 
his  heart,  —  he  had  an  outward  revelation,  but 
no  spiritual  discovery  of  Christ.  His  knowl 
edge,  being  exterior  only,  wrought  no  moral 
change  within,  and,  in  the  midst  of  extraordi 
nary  mental  illumination,  he  remained  an  infidel 
at  heart,  even  while  enjoying  an  outward  com 
munion  with  the  God  whom  he  neither  loved 
nor  honored,  nor,  except  by  constraint,  obeyed. 
The  case  of  this  man  may  be  considered  in 
some  degree  exceptional,  because,  under  both 
Covenants,  the  extraordinary  gifts  of  the  Spirit 

of  First  Corinthians,  where  St.  Paul,  after  enumerating  the  vari 
ous  extraordinary  gifts  then  enjoyed  by  believers,  concludes  by 
saying,  "  Yet  show  I  unto  you  a  more  excellent  way,"  and  goes 
on  to  unfold  the  nature  of  a  grace, —  even  charity. —  See  Wes 
ley's  Thirty-ninth  Sermon. 
*  Edwards  on  the  Religious  Affections. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  93 

have  been  in  general  accompanied  by  a  measure 
of  grace  in  proportion  ;  but  other  instances  *  are 
not  wanting  to  show  that  these  occasional  influ 
ences  of  the  Holy  Ghost  are  not  necessarily  at 
tended  with  that  communication  of  it  throuoh 

& 

which  we  become  partakers  of  the  Divine  Na 
ture,  —  a  communication  as  far  transcending 
them  as  the  permanent  exceeds  the  temporary, 
or  the  essential  surpasses  the  merely  accidental. 
An  over-estimation  of  the  extraordinary  work 
ings  of  the  Spirit  —  sometimes  manifested  in  an 
uneasy  anxiety  for  their  recall  —  betrays  that  we 
have  not  yet  arrived  at  a  due  appreciation  of  its 
crowning  work,  the  imparting  of  its  own  nature 
to  the  human  soul,  to  which  these  outward  en 
dowments  subserved  merely  as  means  to  an  end. 
And  here  we  shall  do  well  to  bestow  some 
thought  on  a  wonderful  and  little  understood 
text,  f  "He  that  believeth  on  me,  the  works 

*  Instances  such  as  those  of  Gideon,  Jephthah,  Samson,  and 
Saul,  men  of  irregular  lives  and  unconverted  hearts,  yet  spoken 
of  as  being,  at  certain  times  and  upon  extraordinary  occasions, 
under  the  immediate  influence  of  the  "  Spirit  of  God,"  are  enough 
to  prove  that  a  temporary  delegation  of  God's  power  can  be  be 
stowed,  without  imparting  that  communication  of  His  Nature 
•which  is  inseparable  from  the  lowliest  operation  of  Sanctifying 
grace.  The  New  Testament  furnishes  an  eminent  example  of 
this  in  the  case  of  Caiaphas,  who,  being  High-Priest,  prophesied, 
in  virtue  of  his  office,  of  the  glory  of  Him  whom  he  was  even 
then  taking  counsel  to  destroy. 

t  John  xiv.  12. 


94  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

that  I  do  shall  he  do  also,  and  greater  works  than 
these  shall  he  do,  because  I  go  unto  my  Father." 
In  these  words,  "  the  works  that  I  do,"  our 
Saviour  alludes  to  His  visible  miracles  exerted 
in  the  Kingdom  of  Nature,  and  exhibiting  His 
rule  and  sovereignty  over  it.  These,  in  splen 
dor  and  variety,  were  never  surpassed  by  the 
Apostles ;  and  as  the  degree  of  power  over 
material  things  which  the  Lord  of  Nature  was 
pleased  to  delegate  to  His  first  servants  was  not 
long  continued  to  the  Church,  it  has  become 
evident  that  the  outward  Signs  and  Tokens 
which  accompanied  the  founding  of  our  Saviour's 
Empire  on  earth  do  not  form  part  of  the  econ 
omy  by  which  that  empire  is  sustained,  and  that 
it  is  not  in  the  Kingdom  of  Nature,  the  kingdom 
without  us,  that  we  are  to  look  for  the  fulfilment 
of  the  promise.  It  is,  therefore,  in  Christ's  other 
kingdom,  even  the  Kingdom  of  Grace  within  us, 
and  in  the  greater  works  that  belong  to  it,  that 
we  must  expect  to  see  its  abundant  realization. 
Here,  through  the  Spirit  of  God,  acting  with 
Man's  spirit  in  the  sphere  of  ordinary  Christian 
exertion,  the  blind  may  still  receive  their  sight, 
the  lepers  be  cleansed,  the  spiritually  dead  be 
raised  to  life  ;  and  why  are  these  works  greater, 
inasmuch  as  spirit  transcends  matter,  than  any 
outward  miracle  even  now  possible  ?  Why  are 


A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN.  95 

all  things,  falling  within  these  boundaries  that 
God  hath  appointed,  possible  to  him  that  believ- 
eth  ?  Because,  saith  our  Lord,  /  go  to  my  Father  ; 
go  to  receive  gifts  for  men,  yea,  even  for  the  re 
bellious,  that  the  Lord  their  God  may  dwell 
among  them  ;  —  go  to  make  and  to  keep  open  a 
Highway  for  the  people  whom  I  have  redeemed ; 
go  to  pray  for  them,  to  strengthen  them,  to  pro 
vide  them  with  an  indwelling  Comforter,  —  the 
Spirit  of  Truth  and  of  Peace,  the  Spirit  of  Wis 
dom  and  Revelation,  the  Spirit  of  Love  and  of 
Power.  If  ye  loved  me,  or  yourselves  in  me, 
ye  would  rejoice,  because  I  go  unto  the  Father. 

Until,  therefore,  it  is  proved  that  the  Son  is 
now  less  present  with  the  Father  than  when  He 
first  ascended  up  to  Him,  the  Spirit  less  present 
with  the  Church  now  than  when  it  was  at  first 
bestowed,  it  seems  difficult  to  discover  what  ad 
vantage,  as  regards  the  things  that  belong  to  life 
and  godliness,  the  primitive  age  possessed  over 
our  own,  or  upon  what  grounds  we  accustom 
ourselves  to  contemplate  the  piety,  zeal,  and  love 
of  the  first  Christians,  as  we  might  look  upon 
some  old  master-work  in  painting  or  stained 
glass,  —  an  excellence  rather  to  be  marvelled 
at  than  attained  to.  Yet  we  have  no  need  to 
envy  their  privileges  and  endowments,  only  to  use 
our  own.  They  were  in  possession  of  no  secrets 


96  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

to  which  we  have  not  now  the  key ;  and  if  we 
knew  what  the  true  Gift  of  God  is,  and  felt  in 
how  much  all  of  an  outward  kind  that  even  He 
has  to  bestow  upon  us,  is  exceeded  by  that  ac 
cess  to  His  Presence  and  union  with  His  Na 
ture,  which  it  lies  within  the  faithful  acceptance 
and  use  of  our  ordinary  Christian  privileges  to 
impart,*  we  should  confess  that  they  who  have 
the  Giver  have  all,  and  need  not  mourn  over  the 
withdrawal  of  any  particular  gift.  We  regret 
the  things  which  have  been  taken  away,  chiefly 
through  our  imperfect  recognition  of  the  things 
which  remain.  Though  miracles,  tongues,  and 
prophesyings  have  ceased,  "  now  abideth"  Faith, 

*  "One  standard  of  life"  says  Neander,  "  applies  to  all  Chris 
tians;  the  difference,  as  regards  the  reception  of  God's  truth,  be 
tween  the  inspired  Prophet  and  the  ordinary  believer  is  one  of 
degree,  not  of  kind." 

And  it  is  surely  very  instructive  to  observe  how  much  stress 
the  Apostles  lay  upon  that  which  is  general,  how  little  upon  that 
which  is  peculiar,  in  their  own  position  in  Christ,  —  how  simply 
they  place  their  converts  just  where  they  stand  themselves.  As 
men  before  whom  a  great  work  has  been  set  by  God,  they  know 
that  they  have  been  endowed  by  Him  with  eminent  gifts  and 
graces,  and  to  this  St.  Paul  occasionally  testifies  with  devout 
thankfulness,  as  when  he  magnifies  his  office.  Yet  even  such  an 
office  seems  but  a  small  thing  to  one  who,  being  joined  unto  the 
Lord,  knows  what  it  is  to  be  of  one  Spirit  with  Him  and  His. 
"  There  are  diversities  of  operations,  but  one  Lord."  It  matters 
little  whether  a  member's  office  appears  more  or  less  honorable, 
whether  he  be  foot  or  hand,  so  long  as  he  is  of  the  Body,  living  on 
its  fulness,  and  growing  with  its  growth.  "  And  we,"  says  St. 
Paul,  "  are  members  of  His  body,  of  His  flesh,  and  of  His  bones." 


A  PRESENT  HEA  YEN.  97 

Hope,  Charity ;  *  and  how  much,  inasmuch  as 
the  moral  is  more  noble  than  the  material,  is  a 
grace  better  than  a  gift !  How  much  does  the 
House,  even  Sanctification,  or  the  renewal  of 
man's  body,  soul,  and  spirit  unto  God,  exceed 
in  glory  that  by  means  of  which  it  was  builded ! 
The  outward  exhibitions  of  God's  providence 
are  like  the  strong  wind  which  rends  the  moun 
tains,  —  like  the  earthquake  and  the  fire,  they 
declare  His  Majesty  and  Awfulness,  they  show 
us  that  the  Lord  passes  by,f  but  HE  HIMSELF 
is  in  the  still  small  voice. 

God  Himself  is  there.  Does  not  the  knowl 
edge  of  this,  in  the  fact  that  the  Almighty,  in 
the  communication  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  imparts 
His  own  nature  to  the  human  soul,  wonderfully 
extend  and  deepen  the  sense  of  our  spiritual  re 
lations  with  Him,  and  give  a  yet  fuller  meaning 
to  our  Lord's  saying,  "  Whatsoever  ye  shall  ask 
in  my  name,  believing,  ye  shall  receive  "  ? 

Believing,  ye  shall  receive  all  things,  even  God 
Himself.  For  even  as  earthly  fathers,  of  such 
things  as  they  have,  give  good  gifts  unto  their 
children,  even  so  will  our  Heavenly  Father, 
because  He  can  bestow  nothing  greater,  impart 
Himself  to  those  in  whom  in  His  one  beloved 
Son  He  is  well  pleased.  God,  who  so  loved  the 

*  1  Cor.  xiii.  t  1  Kings  xix. 

5  G 


98  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

world  that  He  gave  His  only  begotten  Son  to 
die  for  it,  that  the  world  through  Him  might  be 
saved,  communicates  through  the  Spirit  that 
love  which  was  manifested  in  the  Son ;  *  and 
this  communication  is  set  before  us  in  Scripture 
as  the  great  object  of  prayer  —  may  we  not  say 
that  it  is  the  final  object  of  all  prayer,  the  ful 
ness  of  the  blessing  of  the  Gospel  St.  Paul 
spoke  of,  making  its  every  gift  and  promise  our 
own  ?  And  if  the  gift  —  that  which  our  Heav 
enly  Father  will  give  to  them  that  ask  Him  — 
is  the  object  of  all  prayer,  is  not  its  increase  — 
that  which  He  will  make  to  abound  more  and 
more  in  them  that  serve  Him  —  the  object  of  all 
endeavor  ?  While  from  him  that  hath  not  — 
from  him  who  possesses  not  that  which  is  his 
own  —  shall  be  taken  away,  gradually  perhaps, 
but  surely,  even  that  which  he  hath,  until  the 
light  that  is  in  him,  his  portion  of  the  true  light 
which  lighteneth  every  man  that  cometh  into 
the  world,  is  turned  into  darkness,  —  "  To  him 
that  hath  shall  be  given,  and  he  shall  have 
abundance."  He  shall  receive  of  gifts  without 
measure  as  they  are  without  price.  He  shall  be 
satisfied  with  the  plenteousness  of  God's  house, 
and  shall  drink  of  its  pleasures  as  out  of  the 
river :  "  Eat,  O  friends  ;  drink,  yea,  drink  abun 
dantly,  O  beloved." 

*  1  John  iv.  9. 


IV. 


THE   GOSPEL  RECEIVED   PROPHETICALLY. 


"Say  not  in  thine  heart,  Who  shall  ascend  into  heaven?  tJiat  is,  to  bring 
Christ  down  from  above." — ROM.  x.  6. 


the  truths  which  Revelation 
makes  known  to  us,  there  are  some 
which  so  directly  approve  themselves 
to  our  human  consciousness,  so  meet 
its  inner  wants,  so  satisfy  its  upward  aspirations, 
that  the  soul,  cheered  by  the  sunshine  they  cast 
round  them,  is  apt  to  repose  in  it  with  a  too  ex 
clusive  complacency.  And  among  these  divine 
ly  established  facts  I  know  not  one  to  which  the 
heart  of  Man,  wounded  by  the  sorrows,  and 
wearied  with  the  troubles  of  the  present  life, 
has  responded  with  a  wider  or  more  universal 
consent  than  has  been  accorded  to  the  scriptural 
testimony  upon  which  the  happiness  of  the  dead 
who  die  in  the  Lord  is  established.  To  the 
Voice  which  has  proclaimed  them  "  blessed," 


100  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

the  Spirit  has  made  answer  in  a  "yea"  as  fer 
vent  as  earth  ever  sent  back  to  heaven. 

"  Yea,  it  is  well  with  them,  their  course  is  finished, 
For  them  there  is  no  longer  any  future." 

We  know  that  they  have  passed  into  a  state, 
waiting  for  whose  perfection,  not  only  we,  who 
have  the  First  Fruits  of  the  Spirit,  but  the 
whole  of  God's  natural  creation,  groan  and  trav 
ail  together  in  pain,  —  a  state  wherein  they  know 
even  as  they  are  known,  and  love  even  as  they 
are  loved,  —  a  state  wherein  they  have  arrived 
at  that  full  "  apprehension ''  of  Christ  which  His 
most  favored  servants  upon  earth  have  confessed 
that  they  must  still  reach  after.  Yet  I  think, 
while  it  is  impossible  in  thought  or  word  or 
prayer  to  dwell  with  too  much  delight  upon  the 
coming  in  of  that  which  is  perfect,  we  should  be 
careful  in  doing  so  to  remember  that  the  Prom 
ise  of  the  Future,  fondly  as  we  are  inclined  to 
rest  upon  it,  is  simply  contingent  upon  that 
which  it  only  seems  to  exceed  in  glory,  —  the 
unspeakable  gift  vouchsafed  to  us  in  the  Pres 
ent.  We  must  not  allow  a  shadow,  although 
it  be  the  shadow  of  good  things  to  come,  to 
eclipse,  even  for  a  moment,  the  substance  of  good 
things  already  obtained.  The  promise  grows 
out  of  the  gift ;  and  that  gift  is  "  Christ  in  us," 
out  of  which  the  hope  of  glory,  its  exceeding 


A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN.  101 

and  eternal  weight,  unfolds  by  way  of  natural 
development. 

"  He  that  hath  the  Son  hath  life  "  ;  —  a  deep 
ened  sense  of  this  truth  would  work  within  us  a 
dissatisfaction  with  the  vague  impressions  which, 
upon  many  points  connected  with  death  and  the 
future  state,  have  too  much  taken  the  place  of 
Gospel  realities  among  us.  In  explaining  what 
I  now  mean,  I  need  only  draw  your  attention  to 
the  manner  in  which,  in  those  unpremeditated 
expressions  which  reveal  our  real  sentiments  far 
more  clearly  than  any  guarded  statement  of 
opinion,  we  are  accustomed  to  refer  to  the  sepa 
ration  of  the  soul  and  body.  As  Christians  we 
permit  ourselves,  upon  this  awful  subject,  to  use 
language  strangely  inconsistent  with  our  name 
and  profession,  —  language  which,  if  reduced  to 
its  true  sense  and  value,  would  go  far  to  make  it 
appear  that  we  had  chosen  death,  not  Christ  for 
our  Saviour,  and  which,  even  under  every  al 
lowance  for  the  vagueness  of  popular  expression, 
betrays  an  ignorance  of  the  nature  and  condi 
tions  of  spiritual  life,  that  leaves  us,  in  the  very 
heart  of  our  Christian  privileges,  in  a  sort  of 
Jewish  Estate,  wherein,  as  if  unsatisfied  with 
Him  who  is  already  come,  we  seem  to  be  yet 
looking  for  another.  Nothing  is  so  common  as 
to  hear  Death  spoken  of  as  the  entrance  to  a 


102  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

better  life,*  nor  is  it  unusual  even  from  the  pul 
pit  to  listen  to  expressions  which  imply  that  the 
soul,  so  long  as  it  remains  united  to  its  weaker 
partner,  must  inevitably  partake  of  its  imper 
fection,  to  a  degree  which  draws  its  capacity  for 
spiritual  attainments  and  enjoyments  within  very 
narrow  limits. 

True  it  is  that  so  long  as  we  continue  in  the 
body  we  have  yet  to  wait  for  that  body's  full  re 
demption,!  anticipating  which  the  natural  crea 
tion  and  the  regenerated  spirit  of  man  groan 
together,  "  being  burdened."  The  "  earnest  ex 
pectation  "  even  of  the  natural  heart  impels  it  to 
hope  and  onward  looking,  far  more  does  that  of 
the  renewed  nature  urge  it  upon  the  thought  of 
final  deliverance  from  a  bondage  yet  not  wholly 
broken,  a  contradiction  yet  not  fully  overcome. 
He  that  is  dead  is  freed  from  sin.  Yet  we  must 
never  forget  that  not  only  Immortality  but  Life 
has  been  brought  to  light  by  the  Gospel,  and  we 
ought  jealously  to  guard  against  whatever  tends 
to  invest  it  with  a  promissory,  and,  so  to  speak, 
prophetic  aspect,  by  transferring  its  cardinal 
benefits  to  a  future  period  and  remote  scene  of 
existence  ;  and  thus,  by  implication,  deprives  the 
meritorious  satisfaction  of  our  Saviour  —  the  One 
Foundation  upon  which  Scripture  authorizes  us 

*  See  Note  H.  f  Romans  viii.  23. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  103 

to  build  up  our  whole  spiritual  life  —  of  the  na 
ture  of  a  real  and  effected  work.*  When  we 
look  to  Death  to  admit  us  to  privileges  which 
are  already  conferred  upon  us  in  the  blood  of 
reconciliation,  we  imply  that  this  full,  perfect, 
and  sufficient  Sacrifice,  like  the  Legal  offerings 
which  prefigured  it,  does  not  contain  within  it 
that  which  can  make  the  comers  thereto  perfect. 
We  take  the  Key  from  off  the  shoulder  of  the 
true  Eliakim,  "  who  openeth  and  no  man  shut- 
teth,"  whenever  we  look  to  death  to  subdue,  as 
by  some  magical  process,  an  enmity  which  Christ 
has  already  taken  away,  and  to  effect  a  reconcil 
iation  which,  by  One  offer-ing,  He  has  perfected 
forever.  When  wre  speak  as  if  we  expected  a 
merely  natural  event,  such  as  the  dissolution 
of  our  bodily  forces,  to  exert  some  mysterious 

*  Wherever  there  is  a  transference  of  the  Blessings  of  the 
Gospel  to  a  Future  time,  as  wherever  there  is  a  limitation  of 
them  in  the  Present,  there  exists,  as  I  observed  in  my  Second 
Letter,  an  unsuspected  disposition  to  bring  down  the  Atonement 
from  a  Reality  to  a  Type,  —  to  reduce  it  from  something  done,  to 
something  merely  foreshown  and  promised.  Yet  it  is  not,  like 
the  Patriarch,  "  in  a  figure,"  that  the  Christian  must  receive  that 
Lord,  who,  when  he  ascended  up  on  high,  and  led  captive  our 
Race's  long  Captivity,  received  for  us  men,  not  promises,  but 
gifts.  As  He  that  dwells  among  us  is  alive  forevermore,  so  are 
all  the  benefits  included  in  His  Work  and  in  His  Abiding,  real, 
living,  and  immediate,  and  the  Blessings  of  the  New  Covenant, 
of  which  He  is  the  Minister,  are  in  the  strictest  sense  as  temporal 
—  that  is,  as  surely  our  own  in  this  present  life  —  as  were  the 
Blessings  of  the  Elder  one. 


104  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

influence  upon  the  relations  on  which  the  life  of 
the  soul  depends,  we  only  prove  that  we  have 
not  yet,  even  in  thought,  probed  to  the  deep- 
sunken  foundation  of  all  spiritual  vitality.  We 
betray  the  same  confusion  of  spiritual  with  nat 
ural  existence,  and  the  same  inability  to  distin 
guish  between  each  in  its  separate  province, 
which  made  Nicodemus  ask,  when  urged  to  en 
ter  into  a  new  and  higher  life,  "  How  can  a  man 

£3  7 

enter  a  second  time  into  his  mother's  womb,  and 
be  born  ?  "  Our  Lord's  answer  places  the  dis 
tinction  in  the  clearest  light :  — 

"  That  which  is  born  of  the  flesh  is  flesh. 
That  which  is  born  of  the  Spirit  is  spirit.  Mar 
vel  not,  therefore,  that  I  said  unto  thee,  Ye  must 
be  born  again." 

"  That  which  is  born  of  the  flesh  is  flesh,"  — 
a  natural  process  is  sufficient  for  a  natural  end, 
but  it  can  go  no  farther.  A  spiritual  operation 
demands  for  its  accomplishment  a  spiritual  en 
ergy.  As  none  can  enter  into  God's  natural 
kingdom,  or  partake  of  the  life  which  belongs  to 
it,  without  passing  through  the  appointed  channel 
of  natural  birth,  so  is  it,  by  analogy,  with  every 
one  that  is  born  of  the  Spirit.  None  can  enter 
into  the  kingdom  of  grace,  or  become  a  partaker 
of  its  spiritual  life,  but  by  means  of  the  processes 
and  conditions  upon  which  it  has  been  made  to 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  105 

depend.  To  set  these  two  states  of  existence  — 
the  life  through  which  man  becomes  a  living 
soul,  and  the  life  by  which  he  is  made  a  quick 
ened  spirit  —  clearly  before  us,  —  to  see  how,  in 
the  case  of  each  one  amongst  us,  they  hold  on 
their  course,  together  yet  distinct,  —  is  to  be 
aware  that  neither  life  nor  death,  nor  any  other 
creature,  that  is,  any  power  or  energy  belonging 
to  God's  natural  kingdom,  can  influence  the 
spiritual  relations  to  which  our  renewed  exist 
ence  has  been  attached.  With  regard  to  the 
nature  of  this  renewed  life,  the  Scriptures  have 
been  most  explicit,  equally  so  as  to  the  condi 
tions  by  which  it  holds.  They  acquaint  us  with 
a  state  of  being  to  be  attained  to,  not  through 
death,  but  through  Him  who  hath  overcome  it, 
and  opened  for  us  the  gate  of  everlasting  life ; 
they  unfold  to  us  in  its  amplest  particulars  the 
character  of  this  eternal  life  as  revealed  to  us  in 
the  person  of  Christ  Jesus,  to  whom  alone  it  has 
been  given  to  have  life  in  Himself,*  and  from 
whom  all  our  life  is  derived.  They  set  this  life 
before  us  in  contradistinction  to  its  true  antago 
nist,  Spiritual  death,  or  the  alienation  of  the  soul 
from  God,  and  show  us  that  it  is  from  this  death,! 

*  John  v.  26. 

t  When  St.  Paul,  in  the  agony  of  his  mental  conflict,  asks, 
Who  shall  deliver  me  from  the  body  of  this  death,  the  law  of  sin 
which  is  in  my  members  ?  he  finds  an  answer  in  looking  to  a 


106  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

even  the  darkness  and  decay,  the  bondage  of  cor 
ruption  to  which  the  natural  heart  is  subject, 
that  we  must  pass  by  spiritual  regeneration  into 
the  life  and  liberty  of  the  children  of  God. 
They  speak  plainly  as  to  the  conditions  by  which 
this  life  is  attained  to  and  supported :  Faith  in 
Him  who  hath  obtained  it  for  us.  "  He  that 

spiritual  change,  not  to  a  natural  one;  "  the  law  of  the  Spirit  of 
Life  in  Christ  Jesus  has  made  me  free  from  the  law  of  sin  and 
death."  He  does  not  wait  for  the  dissolution  of  the  flesh  to  ob 
tain  freedom  from  the  bondage  of  its  corruption,  but  places  his 
deliverance  from  it  in  Him  who,  coming  in  the  likeness  of  sinful 
flesh,  in  that  flesh  overcame  sin,  and  has  given  unto  them  that  are 
in  Him  the  power  to  overcome  it,  "  even  as  He  also  overcame." 
We  are  apt  to  speak  as  if  it  were  the  natural  body  which  sepa 
rates  the  human  spirit  from  its  Maker.  Yet  it  is  not  the  flesh,  but 
that  which  remains  in  it,  the  carnal  mind  at  enmity  against  God, 
which  constitutes  the  only  true  ground  of  alienation  from  Him. 
Many  things  may  hide  God  from  us,  one  thing  only  can  separate 
us  from  Him,  unresisted,  unrepented  sin;  and  the  flesh,  though 
it  may  draw  a  veil  between  the  soul  and  God's  presence,  that 
light  unto  which  no  man  living  can  approach,  can  oppose  no 
barrier  between  it  and  His  favor.  "  They  who  are  in  the  flesh 
cannot  please  God,"  by  which  expression  it  is  evident,  from  what 
follows,  St.  Paul  means,  not  the  remaining  in  the  natural  body, 
but  the  continuing  in  the  natural,  unrenewed  mind,  for  "  Ye,"  he 
says,  "  are  not  in  the  flesh,  but  in  the  Spirit,  if  so  be  that  the 
Spirit  of  God  dwelleth  in  you."  Our  popular  notions  respecting 
death,  and  the  prevailing  disposition  to  connect  the  soul's  per 
fection  with  its  separation  from  the  body,  seem  based  upon  an 
unconscious  Manicheism,  which,  supposing  an  inherency  of  evil 
in  Matter,  places  it  as  the  antagonist  of  God.  We  seem  to  forget 
that  Christ  is  "  the  Saviour  of  the  body,"  as  well  as  the  Re 
deemer  of  the  soul;  the  Preserver  and  Sanctifier  of  the  whole  Na 
ture,  body,  soul,  and  spirit,  which,  in  being  made  Man,  He  took 
upon  Himself  forever. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  107 

believeth  on  the  Son  hath  everlasting  life.  He 
that  believeth  not  the  Son  shall  not  see  life,  but 
the  wrath  of  God,  the  darkness  and  shadow  of 
death,  abideth  on  him." 

And  here,  I  think,  we  have  especial  need  of 
the  work  of  the  Comforter.  When  we  have 
received  the  witness  of  the  Spirit  bearing  wit 
ness  with  our  spirit  that  we  are  the  children  of 
God,  and,  if  children,  then  heirs,  our  experience 
works  hope,  and  gives  us,  as  it  were,  ground  to 
stand  upon  in  heaven.  They  who  have  received 
the  Earnest*  know  enough  of  the  Inheritance, 
and  of  Him  in  whom  they  have  obtained  it, 
to  see  clearly  that  spiritual  and  eternal  life  are 
identical.  All  renewed  life,  being  one  with  that 
of  the  Renewer,  is  one  life ;  the  same  life, 
whether  its  outward  circumstances  be  more  or 
less  happy,  —  whether,  in  short,  it  be  spent  in 
heaven  above,  or  upon  earth  below.  And  to 
speak  of  our  present  and  our  future  life  in 
Christ  as  being  in  any  way  separate  from  each 
other,  is  to  draw  a  distinction  which  our  Lord 
Himself  is  most  careful  to  avoid.  "  He  that 
believeth  on  me  hath  everlasting  life."  On  this 
point,  as  you  long  ago  observed  to  me,  the  very 
wording  of  Scripture  is  guarded  ;  there  is  no 
future  employed,  it  is  not  "  shall  have,"  but 

*  Eph.  i.  14. 


108  A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN. 

u  hath,"  —  hath  now  everlasting  life,  —  a  life  be 
gun  in  Christ ;  and  over  a  life  so  begun,  it  is 
evident  that  no  outward  accident,  such  as  the 
dissolution  of  the  bodily  organs,  can  exert  any 
empire.  When  the  breath  of  man  goeth  forth, 
he  turns  again  to  his  dust.  At  the  touch  of 
death,  the  flower  and  grass  of  our  natural  life 
fall  away  and  perish,  but  the  Word  of  God,  and 
that  which  is  born  of  it,  endureth  forever.  Our 
spiritual  life  lies  in  a  region  far  removed  from 
the  influence  of  any  natural  event  or  change  ; 
it  is  hid  in  Christ :  and  St.  Paul  proves  how 
much  our  future  life  in  Him  is  but  the  continua 
tion  and  expansion  of  that  which,  even  in  the 
flesh,  we  live  by  the  faith  of  the  Son  of  God, 
when  he  says,  "  When  Christ,  who  is  our  life, 
shall  appear,  then  shall  ye  also  appear  with  Him 
in  glory." 

The  real  life  will  then  be  also  the  visible  and 
apparent  one  ;  and  in  dwelling  upon  this,  the 
manifestation  of  the  sons  of  God,  for  which  St. 
Paul  represents  the  faithful  as  waiting  in  earnest 
expectation,  we  learn  in  what  the  true  blessed 
ness  of  death  consists.  Though  it  cannot,  ac 
cording  to  the  popular  phrase,  admit  us  to  a 
better  life,  it  will  give  those  who  have  already 
attained  to  the  one  life  —  the  life  which  is  in 
Christ  Jesus  —  a  better  world  wherein  to  live  ; 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  109 

it  will  immeasurably  extend  and  glorify  the  out 
ward  conditions  under  which  the  development 
of  that  life  will  proceed.  Our  present  life  in 
Christ  may  be  compared  to  that  of  the  seed  ;  a 
hidden  life,  contending  underground  against  cold 
and  darkness  and  obstructions,  yet  bearing  within 
its  breast  the  indestructible  germ  of  vitality. 
Death  lifts  the  soul  into  the  sunshine  for  which 
a  hidden,  invisible  work  has  prepared  it.  Heaven 
is  the  life  of  the  flower. 

It  is  enough  for  the  disciple  that  he  be  as  his 
Master ;  for  the  servant  that  he  be  as  his  Lord. 
Our  present  life  in  Christ  is  like  the  life  which 
He  lived  upon  earth  ;  a  life  harassed  and  tempt 
ed,  sometimes  agonized,  often  sorrowful ;  a  life 
wherein  He  was  not  alone,  because  the  Father 
was  with  Him  ;  yet  a  life  which  those  who  loved 
Him  were  none  the  less  called  upon  to  rejoice 
when  He  laid  it  down,  and  returned  to  the 
bosom  of  that  Father's  love.  Our  future  life 
will  be  like  that  which  He  leads  there.  "  Where 
I  am,  there  shall  also  my  servant  be."  While 
present  with  the  body,  we  remain,  in  a  natural 
sense,  absent  from  the  Lord.  Our  communion 
with  Him  is  only  spiritual,  and  therefore  inca 
pable  of  affording  the  fulness  of  content  to  a 
being  endowed  with  both  spiritual  and  natural 
faculties.  It  cannot  be  with  us  in  the  Taber- 


HO  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

nacle  *  as  it  will  be  in  the  House.  Here,  one 
half  of  us  groans,  being  burdened,  waiting  for 
the  redemption  of  the  body,  the  final  swallowing 
up  of  mortality  in  life,  which  is  the  promised 
restitution  of  all  things,  admitting  both  body 
and  soul  and  spirit  into  the  glorious  liberty  of 
the  children  of  God.  No  marvel,  then,  that 
they  who  can  say  with  St.  Paul,  "  to  live  is 
Christ,"  should  with  him  also  say,  "  to  die  is 
gain."  No  marvel  that  the  soul  which  has  tasted 
of  the  first  fruits  which  are  holy,  should  long  to 
be  where  the  lump  also  is  holy.  No  marvel  that 
the  spirit  should  awaken  within  the  regenerate 
soul  a  desire  to  depart  and  to  be  with  Christ, 
that  its  inner  consciousness  should  testify  to  the 
existence  of  something  "  far  better"  than  is  here 
to  be  enjoyed.  "  For  he,"  saith  our  Saviour, 
speaking  of  the  Comforter,  "  shall  show  you 
things  to  come."  And  in  accordance  with  these 
words,  whilst  little  in  the  direct  letter  of  Scrip 
ture  has  been  told  us  of  the  mystery  of  future 
blessedness,  much,  in  this  great  matter,  has  been 
shown  us  by  way  of  a  spiritual  analogy,  which 
testifies  that  the  recreated  world  is  in  all  re 
spects  foreshown  and  typified  by  the  regenerate 
soul.  In  the  mind  renewed  after  the  image  in 
which  it  was  first  created,  the  Divine  order  is 

*  2  Cor.  v. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  m 

already  began,  —  the  key-note  of  the  harmony 
to  which  God  will  in  the  end  reduce  all  His 
works,  is  already  struck.  We  often  say  that 
we  can  know  at  present  nothing  about  heaven  ; 
and  are  accustomed  to  quote  in  support  of  this 
a  text  which  proves,  when  taken  in  connection 
with  what  goes  before  and  follows  it,  that  we 
know  or  may  know  a  great  deal.  I  refer  to 
1  Cor.  ii.  9,  10. 

44  Eye  hath  not  seen,  nor  ear  heard,  neither 
have  entered  into  the  heart  of  man,  the  things 
which  God  hath  prepared  for  them  that  love 
Him. 

"  Bat  G-od  hath  revealed  them  unto  us  by  His 
Spirit ;  for  the  Spirit  searcheth  all  things,  yea, 
the  deep  things  of  God." 

These  words,  and  those  which  follow  in  the 
twelfth  verse,  "  Now  we  have  received  of  the 
Spirit  which  is  of  God,  to  know  the  things 
which  have  been  freely  given  us  of  Him,"  and, 
indeed,  the  whole  tenor  of  the  chapter,  make  it 
evident  that  the  Apostle  is  not  looking  beyond 
the  time  that  now  is.  The  mystery*  with  which 
his  thoughts  are  occupied  is  the  life  of  God 

*  1  Cor.  ii.  7.  —  "  We  speak  the  wisdom  of  God  in  a  mystery, 
even  the  hidden  wisdom,  which  God  ordained  before  the  world 
unto  our  glory;  which  none  of  the  princes  of  this  world  knew; 
for  if  they  had  known  it,  they  would  not  have  crucified  the  Lord 
of  glory." 


112  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

within  the  human  soul,  —  that  "  preparation  of 
the  heart  of  man,"  wherein  He  reveals  Himself 
after  a  manner  not  to  be  apprehended  by  out 
ward  sense,  or  recognized  by  natural  perception. 
It  is  the  heaven  within  us,  and  not  the  heaven 
above  us,  that  the  Apostles  would  here  unfold 
to  us  :  he  is  concerned,  not  with  such  things  of 
God  as  we  have  yet  to  wait  for,  but  with  such 
as  we  have  already  received.  "  God,"  he  says, 
"  hath  revealed  them  unto  us  by  His  Spirit." 

And  we  know  much  of  heaven,  if  it  be  but 
in  the  initials  and  rudiments,  wherein,  in  the 
lively  characters  of  love,  peace,  joy,  and  devout 
conformity  to  His  will,  God's  finger  has  traced 
it  in  the  regenerate  soul.  We  speak  more  truly 
than  we  are  aware  of  when  we  say,  as  we  often 
do,  that  we  can  form  no  idea  of  what  heaven 
really  is,  until  we  arrive  there.  The  regenerate 
soul  is  already  in  heaven,  being  by  the  indwell 
ing  of  the  Father,  Son,  and  Spirit  in  possession 
of  that  which  truly  constitutes  it.  To  be  with 
God,  in  whatever  stage  of  being,  under  what 
ever  conditions  of  existence,  is  to  be  in  heaven. 
To  be  found  in  Him,  a  citizen  of  His  lower 
kingdom  of  grace,  is  to  possess  that  which  gives 
His  upper  kingdom  its  glory  ;  for  there,  even  as 
here,  "  a  man's  life  does  not  consist  in  the  abun 
dance  of  the  things  which  he  possesses  " ;  and 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  113 

it  is  not  either  hearing  or  seeing,  not  either  hav 
ing  or  beholding,  that  can  constitute  its  joy. 
The  rainbow  round  about  the  throne,  in  sight 
like  unto  an  emerald  ;  the  sea  of  glass  mingled 
with  fire,  the  gate  of  pearl,  the  voice  of  harpers 
harping  with  their  harps  ;  —  all  these  might  be 
ours,  without  the  capability  of  imparting  a  ray 
of  genuine  blessedness.  They  might  pass  away, 
yet  heaven  would  not  pass  with  them.  For 
these  are  but  the  accidental  properties  of  heaven. 
Its  essentials  consist  in  that  without  which  these 
wonders  and  glories  a  thousand-fold  repeated 
could  convey  nothing  beyond  a  momentary  grat 
ification  of  the  senses.  And  happiness,  be  its 
object  earthly  or  Divine,  resides  in  the  corre 
spondence  between  the  inner  need  and  its  out 
ward  satisfaction :  it  is  the  answer  to  the  soul's 
call,  the  accomplishment  of  its  desire,  the  satis 
fying  of  its  yearning.  "I  beheld,"  saith  St. 
John,  "  and  a  door  was  opened."  Heaven  is 
the  opening  of  a  door :  it  is  the  finding  of  a 
long-sought  good,  the  renewal  of  a  long-lost 
communion,  the  restoration  to  a  favor  which  is 
in  itself  the  fulness  of  joy. 

The  Gospel  has  brought  down  Heaven  into  our 
souls  ;  God's  message  of  reconciliation  has  plant 
ed  within  us  a  germ,  out  of  which  He  can  mould 
at  will  a  Universe  of  Blessedness.  I  think  an 


114  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

unconscious  Materialism  mingles  largely  in  the 
vague  spirituality,  or  rather  indefinitism,  of  our 
ideas  with  regard  to  our  Future  Life :  we  think, 
in  a  certain  sense,  too  much  of  the  palpable 
glories  of  Heaven,  too  little  of  that  in  which 
they  consist.  It  is  the  Altar  which  sanctifies 
the  gold,  —  the  Presence  of  Him  that  dwelleth 
therein  which  consecrates  the  Temple.  We 
must  never,  in  our  contemplations  on  this  great 
subject,  forget  that  not  only  hath  He  who  buildeth 
the  house  "  more  honor  than  the  house  itself," 
but  they  also  for  whom  it  is  builded.  Yet  we 
dc  so,  when,  in  favor  of  any  of  God's  outward 
works,  be  it  the  Heaven  which  He  hath  made 
for  Himself,  or  the  Earth  which  He  hath  given 
to  the  children  of  men,  we  lose  sight  of  His 
work  within  us,  that  crowning  achievement  of 
Almighty  wisdom  and  infinite  love,  which  it  cost 
even  God  so  much  to  bring  to  perfection.  For 
the  Heavens,  which  are  God's  throne,  like  our 
Earth,  which  is  His  footstool,  were  called  out  of 
nothingness  by  the  simple  exercise  of  the  Divine 
energy.  "  He  spake,  and  they  were  made  ;  He 
commanded,  and  they  stood  fast  for  ever."  There 
was  no  pang  here,  no  effort :  what  a  word  is  to 
man,  such  is  a  world  to  God,  the  simple  expres 
sion  of  His  thought.  This  visible  Temple  to 
God's  praise  and  glory,  the  system  of  which  our 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  115 

Earth  forms  part,  rose  like  an  exhalation  out  of 
the  Sea  of  His  fulness  silently,  or  to  such  music 
as  the  morning  stars,  God's  eldest-born,  made 
when  they  sang  and  shouted  together  for  joy. 

Thus  was  it  with  the  work  of  Creation  ;  but 
Redemption,  as  the  Psalmist  tells  us,  "  cost 
more  "  :  the  foundation  of  these  outer  Courts 
was  laid  in  harmony ;  but  when  God  would  re 
pair  their  desolations,  and  raise  up  from  the  dust 
His  ruined  shrine  within,  it  was  through  the 
anguish  of  a  wise  and  loving  Master  builder. 
Each  one  of  the  living  stones  whereof  God's 
spiritual  house  is  framed,  bears  upon  it  the  dint 
of  His  travail,  —  that  travail  of  the  Soul  whose 
sweat  was  blood.  And  now  that  the  hands  * 
of  Him  who  laid  the  foundations  of  the  reno 
vated  Temple  have  also  finished  it;  now  that 
the  headstone  thereof  has  been  brought  forth 
with  shoutings  of  "  Grace,  grace,"  let  us  beware 
how  we  read  History  for  Prophecy,  and  look  to 
a  future  state  for  blessings  which  are  abundantly 
our  own  in  our  present  one.  To  do  so,  augurs, 
as  I  have  said,  a  secret  distrust  in  the  efficacy 
of  the  blood  of  reconciliation,  sufficient  to  save 
those  who  come  unto  it,  even  to  the  uttermost, 
—  sufficient  for  our  sins,  our  sorrows,  and  our 
imperfection  ;  the  blood  of  healing  as  well  as  of 

*  Zech.  iv.  7,  9. 


116  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

Atonement ;  the  sign  of  freedom  as  well  as  of 
pardon,  procuring  us  a  present,  and  not,  as  we 
fondly  imagine,  a  future  restoration  to  God's 
favor,  and  making  our  souls  in  His  sight,  as 
the  Disciples  were  made  in  the  washing  which 
prefigured  it,  "  clean  every  whit." 

This,  even  our  Lord's  meritorious  sacrifice,  is 
the  gate  of  the  Lord,  wherein  we  may  even  now 
enter  and  be  glad,  and  that  to  which  it  conducts, 
the  fulness  of  life  and  joy  in  Him,  is  the  true 
heaven ;  whether  it  be  found  in  God's  kingdom 
of  grace  below,  "  which  is  but  glory  begun,"  or 
in  His  kingdom  of  glory  above,  "which  is  but 
grace  completed,  "f 

The  soul,  in  uniting  itself  to  Christ  through 
a  lively  faith,  enters  of  necessity  into  the  imme 
diate  fruition  of  the  fulness  which  is  laid  up  in 
Him,  —  its  immediate  yet  gradual  fruition.  The 
soul's  true  life  has  begun.  Yet  it  has  need  to 
be  nourished,  need  to  be  strengthened.  It  is 
not  all  at  once  made  perfect  in  that  love,  which 
is,  to  speak  truly,  but  faith  grown  to  its  fullest 
stature.  For  when  faith  has  for  its  object  a  Be 
ing  "  altogether  lovely,"  it  must  turn  to  love  in 
exact  proportion  with  its  own  increase.  To 
know  Him  better  is  to  love  Him  more  ;  and  to 
this  knowledge  and  this  love,  it  is  plain  that  the 

*  Archbishop  Leighton. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  117 

mere  passing  out  of  one  phase  of  existence  into 
another  can  never  admit  us.  It  is  not  death 
but  faith  that  must  conduct  us  to  heaven  ;  for  it 
is  faith  only  that  can  conduct  us  to  love.  Death 
may,  indeed,  admit  to  the  immediate  presence 
of  the  Almighty,  but  it  is  through  faith  and  love 
that  His  presence  is  made  unto  us  the  fulness  of 
joy.  Without  a  spiritual  acquaintance  with  our 
Maker,  even  in  His  light  our  souls  would  not 
see  light.  We  might  look  upon  our  Saviour  in 
His  glorified  form,  as  so  many  of  old  beheld 
Him  under  His  human  aspect,  without  seeing 
Him  as  He  is  ;  and  the  touch  which  seals  up  our 
eyes  to  the  things  of  earth  cannot  endue  them 
with  this  spiritual  insight.  Death's  cold  hand 
cannot  draw  us  nearer  God  :  it  is  intrusted  with 
no  Gospel.  His  silent  lips,  though  they  may 
ofttirnes  bear  on  them  God's  kiss,  are  charged 
with  no  message  of  reconciliation. 

What  we  have  made  God  to  us  in  this  world, 
we  shall  find  Him  in  the  after  one ;  for  the  out 
ward  heaven,  think  of  it  as  we  will,  is  but  the 
consummation  of  that  inward  one  already  es 
tablished  in  every  heart,  made  through  God's 
grace,  in  the  communication  of  His  Spirit,  a 
"  partaker  in  the  Divine  nature."  It  is  the 
efflorescence  of  spiritual  life  in  its  fullest  bloom : 
it  is  the  permanent  blossoming  of  the  Christian 


118  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

graces,  buds  not  wholly  expanding  here :  it  is 
love,  joy,  and  peace  made  visible,  made  perfect, 
made  perpetual.  To  the  soul  already  renewed 
after  God's  likeness,  it  is  but,  in  the  words  of 
the  Psalmist,  the  "  awaking  up  "  to  the  blissful 
sense  of  a  perfect  assimilation.  To  the  heart 
already  reconciled  with  its  Heavenly  Friend,  it 
is  but  the  consciousness  of  happiness  that  has 
long  been  its  own :  it  is  only,  as  a  saintly  spirit 
has  expressed  it,  a  transference  to  the  sunshine 
of  our  Father's  sensible  smiles,  — a  sunshine  that 
has  been  upon  it  long. 

For  happiness,  let  us  understand  this  well,  is 
as  truly  our  portion  here  as  above  ;  it  cannot 
fail  to  fall  within  the  lot  of  those  who  have 
chosen  for  their  portion  Him  whose  nature  is 
One  with  infinite,  unalienable  Joy.  God,  in 
communicating  Himself  to  the  soul,  of  necessity 
communicates  happiness ;  and  all  sounds  in 
union  with  Him  have  returned  *  to  their  central 
rest,  and  are  happy  in  exact  proportion  to  the 
closeness  and  fulness  of  their  union,  —  happy,  in 
other  words,  by  so  much  as  they  have  within 
them  of  God.  The  reconciled  soul  has,  there- 

*  Our  very  thirst  after  happiness,  our  very  search  for  it  through 
unworthy  objects,  is  at  once  a  proof  of  our  descent  from  God, 
and  a  witness  of  our  tendency  towards  reunion  with  Him  from 
whom  we  came.  See  on  this  subject  John  Smith's  Select  Dis 
courses. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  119 

fore,  a  right  to  be  at  all  times  joyful,  because  it 
possesses  a  solid,  unalienable  ground  of  hap 
piness  ;  but  this  right  it  is  not  at  all  times  able 
either  to  realize  or  to  make  good  in  this  world, 
wherein  the  child,  although  he  be  heir  of  all, 
differs  ofttimes  not  much  from  a  servant,  in  re 
spect  of  the  things  which  he  has  to  endure. 
Bodily  and  mental  infirmities,  imperfect  views 
of  the  Divine  character,  above  all,  the  lingerings 
of  indwelling  corruption  (that  which  doth  re 
main  within  us,  though  it  may  reign  no  longer), 
rise  like  damps  and  mists  to  obscure  the  contin 
ual  irradiation  which  would  otherwise,  in  the  jus 
tified  soul,  follow  upon  the  simple  consciousness 
of  its  own  position.  Joy  is  conscious  happiness. 
We  may  possess  the  reality  of  happiness  with 
out  the  enjoyment  of  it ;  we  often  do  so  in  tem 
poral  things,  being  more  rich,  more  beloved 
than  we  know  of ;  and  even  thus  with  the  soul : 
it  has  already  the  rich  reality,  but  it  needs  the 
fuller  consciousness  ;  its  acceptance  is  already 
complete,  its  union  is  already  perfect,  but  of  the 
fulness  of  this  acceptance,  the  sweetness  of  this 
union,  it  seems  as  yet  imperfectly  aware.  It 
seems,  as  you  observe  in  your  last  letter,*  inca- 

*  "  No  one  confessed  more  fully  than  St.  Paul  that  he  was 
complete  in  Christ  now;  yet  he  says,  speaking  of  the  future 
state,  '  then  shall  I  know  even  as  I  am  known,'  which  shows,  I 
think,  that  he  saw  Christ's  work  as  regarded  him  to  be  perfect, 


120  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

pable,  under  its  present  conditions,  of  attaining 
to  the  perfect  apprehension  of  the  things  for 
which,  as  St.  Paul  says,  it  has  been  already  ap 
prehended  of  Christ. 

Heaven  is  the  perfect  recognition,  the  com 
plete  reciprocation,  of  that  Love  from  which 
neither  things  to  come,  nor  things  present, 
neither  Death,  nor,  as  so  many  among  us  seem 
to  imagine,  LIFE,  can  separate  us.  "  Beloved," 
says  St.  John,  "  now  are  we  the  Sons  of  God  ; 
and  it  doth  not  yet  appear  what  we  shall  be, 
but  we  know  that  when  He  shall  appear  we 
shall  be  like  Him,  for  we  shall  see  Him  as  He 
is."  Heaven  is  the  becoming  conscious  of  an 
already-formed  assimilation,  the  knowing  as  we 

but  acknowledges  that  his  own  power  of  embracing  it  does  not 
as  yet  equal  that  perfection,  for  he  describes  himself,  in  another 
place,  as  'following  after,'  that  he  may  apprehend,  or  lay  hold  of, 
that  for  which  also  he  is  apprehended  of  Christ.  And  here  lies, 
I  conceive,  the  difference  between  our  present  and  our  future 
state.  On  Christ's  part,  nothing  further  will  be  done  or  required, 
only  we  shall  then  be  quickened  to  apprehend  what  has  been  done 
for  us,  —  to  lay  hold  of  Christ,  to  see  clearly  and  to  know  fullv 
how  fast  He  had  hold  of  us  from  the  beginning,  even  before  we 
knew  it;  and  in  this  sense  it  seems  to  me  our  union  after  death 
must  be  more  perfect  than  it  can  be  before  it.  They  to  whom 
Christ  is  even  now  united  in  bonds  that  admit  of  no  further  per 
fecting,  will  be  awakened  to  the  full  consciousness  of  their  union; 
and  it  will  be  the  difference  between  a  mutual,  living  recognition 
and  embrace,  and  a  greeting  in  which  one  full}'  conscious  draws 
to  his  bosom  the  fainting  and  half-conscious  form  of  his  friend." 
—  J.E.B. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  121 

have  so  long  been  known.  To  the  faithful  Dis 
ciples  who  walked  with  their  Lord  along  the 
common  track,  it  is  but  the  taking  up  upon  the 
Mount,  and  beholding  Him,  whom  they  have  so 
long  loved  and  followed,  "  transfigured  before 
them."  Faith  and  love  are  already  at  home  in 
Heaven  ;  with  all  that  will  meet  them  there, 
they  have  already,  under  lowlier  aspects,  be 
come  familiar.  If  we  know  what  it  is  to  love 
God  and  to  be  beloved  of  Him,  we  shall  no 
longer  speak  of  Heaven  as  if  it  were  a  place  of 
which  we  can  at  present  know  nothing.  We 
shall  not  be  content  to  let  this  good  land,  our 
purchased  inheritance,  float  before  us  in  misty 
outline,  like  Fortunate  Islands  lying  far  amid 
doubtful  seas,  and  to  be  reached  (if  ever  gained 
at  all)  after  the  hap  of  olden  mariners,  blown 
upon  them  by  some  propitious  gale  ;  for  few 
among  us  seem  to  be  so  sailing  by  line  and  com 
pass,  as  to  know  whether  we  are  going  there  or 
not.  Yet  whither  I  go,  saith  the  Lord,  ye  know, 
ind  the  Way  ye  know  ;  if  ye  know  Me,  neither 
the  end  nor  the  way  can  be  unfamiliar. 

To  acquaint  ourselves  with  Christ  is  to  be 
come  acquainted  with  Heaven.  It  is  to  be  able 
to  speak  of  it,  as  was  said  of  a  Saint  of  old,  as 
of  a  place  where  we  have  already  been,  and 
from  whence  we  have  but  returned  upon  an 


122  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

errand.  There  is  no  other  possession  which  has 
been  made  our  own  with  so  much  certainty,  no 
other  place  of  which,  vaguely  as  we  allow  our 
selves  to  speak  of  it,  we  really  know  so  much. 
If  we,  indeed,  know  little  about  Heaven,  it  is 
only  because  we  know  little  about  God,  and 
Jesus  Christ  in  whom  He  is  revealed  ;  for  this, 
the  true  spiritual  acquaintance  with  God,  "is 
life  eternal."  Little,  it  is  true,  has  been  made 
known  to  us  of  the  outward  constitution  of  our 
future  commonwealth,  much  has  been  imparted 
to  us  of  its  inward  conditions,  and  this  through 
experience,  —  good  things  given  instruct  us  in 
good  things  prepared.  Love  that  "prepares" 
Many  Mansions  for  us,  prepares  us  for  what  we 
shall  find  in  them.  We  are  so  ignorant  of  the 
Divine  economy  which  regulates  our  everlasting 
habitations,  that  the  mere  attempt  to  guess  at 
what  will  be  there  our  probable  habits,  pursuits, 
and  occupations,  involves  us  in  a  thousand  diffi 
culties  and  contradictions  ;  and  yet,  while  we 
know  not  how  we  shall  then  live,  we  know  in 
kind,  if  not  in  degree,  how  we  shall  then  feel. 
Here,  while  the  form  and  outline  are  strange  to 
us,  the  imperishable  essence  is  familiar :  we  can 
not  define  either  the  shape  or  color  of  this, 
God's  glorious  Rose,  we  only  know  it  through 
its  fragrance,  unfolding  in  the  regenerate  soul 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  123 

of  man.  We  cannot  paint  this  flower,  yet  love, 
and  peace,  and  joy  in  the  Holy  Ghost  convey 
within  our  hearts  a  subtle  sense  of  its  odor,  and 
instruct  us  in  the  highest  secrets  of  Heaven. 

And  I  would  once  again  ask  in  what,  save  in 
degree  only,  do  the  characteristics  of  renewed 
life,  under  its  present  conditions,  differ  from  re 
newed  life  under  its  future  ones,  —  in  what  re 
spect  can  they  essentially  vary  ?  Is  it  not  the 
same  life  maintaining  its  identity  under  differ 
ent  phases  and  developments,  just  as  an  indi 
vidual  retains  his  personality,  an  affection  its 
strength  and  sweetness,  under  outward  circum 
stances  of  the  most  varied  and  dissimilar  char 
acter  ?  There  are  few  of  us,  perhaps,  so  en 
tirely  limited  within  the  circle  of  the  things 
that  now  appear,  as  not  to  have  sometimes  sent 
a  thought  across  the  visible  horizon  which  bounds 

o 

it,  and  asked  if  the  world  which  lies  beyond  is, 
after  all,  even  in  its  outward  aspect,  so  totally 
unlike  our  present  one  as  we  are  apt  to  imagine. 
Will  they  differ  from  each  other  more  than  one 
star  differs  from  another  in  glory  ?  and  are  we 
not  justified  in  presuming  that,  manifold  as  are 
the  works  of  God,  they  are  in  all  respects  per 
vaded  by  a  certain  harmony,  the  result  of  that 
wisdom  in  which  He  hath  made  them  all  ? 
Such  questions,  only  Heaven  itself,  and  the 


124  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

light  which  makes  all  things  manifest,  can  an 
swer  ;  though  analogy  can  suggest  much,  it  can 
determine  little ;  and  on  all  points  connected 
with  the  outward  frame  and  constitution  of  our 
future  life,  the  silence  of  Scripture  leaves  us 
little  room  to  speak  particularly :  —  but  when 
we  come  to  a  Question  of  far  deeper  practical 
import,  and  ask  ourselves  in  how  far,  as  regards 
that  which  is  within,  our  present  life  may  re 
semble  the  future  one  which  grows  out  of  it, 
these  oracles  of  God  give  forth  no  uncertain 
answer.  They  acquaint  us  with  a  gradual 
moulding  and  fashioning,  the  work  of  no  hu 
man  artificer,  through  which  that  which  lies 
within  us,  as  the  statue  lies  within  the  rude  and 
shapeless  block,  begins  even  here  to  assume 
the  likeness  in  which  it  will  hereafter  attain  its 
final  beauty  and  perfection.  When  they  speak 
to  us  of  our  deliverance  from  the  power  of 
darkness  and  our  translation  into  the  kingdom 
of  God's  dear  Son,  they  set  before  us  a  state 
of  being  in  which  love  to  God  is  even  here  the 
governing  principle  of  life,  the  mainspring  of 
thought  and  action,  as  it  is  with  them,  His  min 
isters  above  that  do  His  pleasure,  and  find  in  it 
their  own ;  a  state  in  which  the  human  will, 
like  the  angelic,  attains  to  such  measure  of  con 
formity  with  the  Divine  law,  that  it  follows  on 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  125 

the  direction  of  God's  Spirit,  in  the  unforced 
obedience,  which,  as  the  Prophet  Ezekiel*  wit 
nesses,  runs  and  returns  as  the  appearance  of  a 
flash  of  lightning:  "Whithersoever  the  Spirit 
was  to  go,  thither  was  their  spirit  to  go  ;  they 
turned  not  when  they  went."  Our  heavenly 
Master  is  not,  as  the  slothful,  unfaithful  servant 
thought  Him,  "  a  hard  man,"  commanding  and 
expecting  impossibilities.  Whatever  God  tells 
us  to  do,  He  also  helps  us  to  do.  Our  Saviour, 
who  knows  whereof  we  are  made,  sends  us  on  no 
vain  errands,  sets  us  upon  no  unprofitable  tasks. 
Whatever  He  makes  an  object  of  prayer,  is  also, 
for  that  very  reason,  an  object  of  attainment ; 
and  He  it  is  who  hath  taught  and  commanded 
us,  when  we  pray,  to  say,  — 

"  Thy  will  be  done  on  earth,  as  it  is  in  heaven." 

*  Ezekiel  i.  14. 


V. 


THE  GOSPEL  RECEIVED   IMPLICITLY. 

"  The  word  is  nigh  thee,  even  in  thy  mouth  and  in  thy  heart ; for 

with  the  heart  man  believeth  unto  righteousness."  —  ROMANS  x.  8-10. 


N  the  preceding  chapters  we  have 
been  chiefly  occupied  with  the  recog- 
_  <  nition  of  Divine  truth,  but  we  now 
'^ISiH^  come  to  consider  its  reception  in  the 
heart,  that  measure  and  degree  of  faith  which  is 
less  conviction  than  possession,  being  itself  the 
substance  of  things  not  as  yet  seen.  This  faith, 
the  soul's  rich,  unborrowed  wealth,  is  not  taken 
on  trust  from  other  men's  minds,  nor  even  from 
the  words  and  promises  of  Scripture ;  it  is  the 
spirit's  grasp  upon  these  very  words,  the  heart's 
appropriation  of  these  very  promises,  making 
them  indeed  our  own. 

What  Locke  speaks  of  natural  science  holds 
especially  true  in  spiritual  life,  "  that  a  man 
only  has  as  much  as  he  really  knows  and  com- 


A  PRESENT  HE  A  YEN.  127 

prebends.  What  he  believes  only  and  takes  on 
trust  from  the  floating  of  other  men's  opinions 
(though  these  opinions  may  happen  to  be  true) 
is  but  borrowed  wealth,  which,  like  fairy  money, 
though  it  were  gold  in  the  hand  from  which  he  re 
ceived  it,  will  be  but  leaves  and  dust  when  it 
comes  to  use."  Opinion  holds  truth  in  its  hand, 
experience  holds  to  it  by  the  heart,  and  to  ex 
perience  only  is  it  given  to  work  within  the  soul 
that  intimate  persuasion  of  God's  love  which 
raises  it  up  to  the  victory  which  overcomes  the 
world.  A  living  faith  is  a  loving  faith ;  how 
can  it  but  believe  in  the  love  by  which  it  lives? 
It  knows  Him  in  Whom  it  has  believed,  and 
needs  no  other  strength  and  wisdom  than  such 
a  knowledge  implies.  It  has  ceased  to  con 
fer  with  flesh  and  blood.  For  the  allurements 
of  sense,  for  the  doubts  of  reason,  for  the  as 
saults  of  spiritual  wickedness,  it  has  gained  one 
answer, 

"  I  have  found  Him  Whom  my  soul  loveth." 

"  To  know  the  love  of  God  as  it  is  in  Christ, 
to  trust  in  it,  to  resign  one's  self  wholly  to  it, 
this  is  believing."  But  is  this  degree  of  belief 
easy  ?  is  it  even  possible  to  man's  unaided  spirit  ? 
Who  that  knows  his  own  heart,  its  darkness,  its 
bewilderments,  its  feebleness  to  good,  will  not 


128  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

be  ready  to  join  in  the  vehement  language  of 
the  great  Reformer,  and  exclaim,*  "  If  any  one 
could  indeed  believe,  then  for  very  joy  he  would 
be  able  neither  to  eat,  nor  drink,  nor  do  aught 
else."  Who  that  compares  his  heart  with  the 
picture  of  the  renewed  heart,  as  the  pencil  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  has  traced  its  clear,  firm  outline  in 
Scripture,  will  be  inclined  to  cavil  at  conversion, 
—  to  dispute  as  to  whether  it  is  in  most  cases 
sudden  or  gradual,  initiative  or  complete,  when 
he  feels  that  in  all  cases  it  is  needed?  The 
Holy  Spirit  works  upon  what  it  finds,  —  the 
history  of  conversion  varies  with  that  of  each 
individual  soul ;  thus,  there  are  persons  who 
need  no  repentance  in  the  sense  of  a  turning  of 
the  outward  life,  but  in  a  deeper  sense,  even 
that  of  the  renewing  from  on  high,  all  need  it. 
Conversion  is  the  consent  of  the  soul  to  God.  It 
is  the  acceptance  of  Christ,  and,  with  Him,  of 
pardon,  deliverance,  freedom ;  it  is  the  with 
drawal  of  the  soul  from  its  own  objects  to  fix 
them  upon  those  with  which  the  doctrine  of 
Christ  presents  it,  and  which  the  natural  heart 
does  not,  cannot  receive.  Conversion  belongs 
to  the  rationale  of  spiritual  life  ;  it  is  a  fact,  at 
which,  even  if  it  were  not  revealed,  were  not 
insisted  upon,  in  Scripture,  the  heart  of  man 

*  Note  I. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  129 

would  arrive  through  its  own  unanswerable  logic. 
Place  these  two  side  by  side,  man  as  he  is  by 
nature,  and  man  as  he  is  seen  in  Christ.  Bid 
these  two  approach,  resemble  each  other  ;  nay 
more,  bid  them  unite,  be  joined  to  each  other, 
not  in  a  mere  outward  bond,  but  in  spiritual 
affinity,  as  like  meets  like.  Compare  the  dis 
positions,  the  desires,  the  objects  of  the  natural 
heart  with  those  attributed  in  Scripture  to  the 
mind  renewed  after  Christ's  likeness.  Is  there 
resemblance  here,  is  there  even  analogy  ?  If 
these  two,  contrary  the  one  to  the  other,  are 
indeed  to  be  made  one,  is  there  not  a  miracle 
needed,  a  mighty  spiritual  and  moral  change, 
such  as  man  has  of  himself  no  power  to  effect, 
—  and  yet  a  power  to  invite  or  to  restrain^  as 
miracles  were  invited  or  restrained  of  old,  —  a 
change  which  Scripture  sets  before  us  under 
many  expressions,  figurative  it  is  true,  yet  de 
scriptive  of  that  which  is  itself  as  real  as  all 
that  is  alone  real,  because  alone  eternal,  as  real 
as  man's  misery,  as  God's  mercy;  as  real  as 
that  Word,  the  expression  of  God's  unchange 
able  purpose,  which  shall  endure  when  Heaven 
and  Earth  shall  pass  away  : 

"  For  as  a  vesture  shalt  thou  change  them,  and  they  shall  be 
changed : 

"  But  thou  art  the  same,  and  thy  years  shall  not  fail." 
6*  I 


130  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

When  the  Apostles  declare  that,  if  any  man 
be  in  Christ,  he  is  a  new  creature,  when  they 
speak  to  us  of  being  dead  or  alive  in  Christ,  of 
putting  on  the  man  from  Heaven,  they  testify 
to  a  change,  a  passing  out  of  one  state  into  an 
other,  a  transition  as  actual  as  that  which  takes 
place  under  what,  in  speaking  of  the  things  of 
daily  life,  we  should  express  by  a  change  of  sit 
uation,  a  change  of  feeling.  And  of  this  change 
the  Apostles  themselves  are,  as  it  were,  the 
unconscious  witnesses  ;  they  know  that  they  have 
passed  from  death  unto  life,  know  it  far  more 
fully  than  even  they  can  express  in  words. 
They  know  it,  not  only  for  themselves,  but  for 
the  weakest  of  their  brethren  "yet  without 
strength."  The  consciousness  of  "  being  in  the 
Lord,"  partakers  in  the  fellowship  of  His  suffer 
ings,  in  the  power  of  His  resurrection,  bound 
up  with  Him  forever  in  the  bundle  of  life,  runs 
like  a  thread  of  fire  through  all  their  writings. 
Even  while  they  are  unfolding  statements  of 
doctrine,  or  settling  questions  of  morals,  the  hid 
den  flame  breaks  forth,  the  secret  consciousness 
glows  into  open  exultation,  "  Who  shall  separate 
us  from  the  love  of  Christ?"  Through  the 
whole  of  some  Epistles,  —  we  may  particularly 
instance  the  Ephesians  and  Colossians,  —  there 
is  a  perpetual  rise  and  overflow  of  that  deep  and 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  131 

sober  joy,  which,  alike  in  natural  and  spiritual 
things,  wells  but  from  one  spring,  the  conscious 
possession  of  a  good,  ever  present  and  all-satisfy 
ing  to  the  heart.  It  is  "  in  the  Lord "  that 
they  rejoice  and  endure,  labor  and  take  rest, 
make  war  and  triumph.  Their  very  life,  as 
they  express  it,  is  hid  in  Christ ;  nothing  that 
belonged  to  it,  sin  only  excepted,  is  extinguished, 
all  is  transferred,  —  affections,  interests,  joys, 
and  sorrows,  these  had  a  sweetness,  a  glory  of 
their  own,  but  it  is  now  transfigured  into  a 
higher  likeness  ;  all  these  earthly  have  been 
made  to  bear  the  image  of  the  heavenly.  Old 
things  are  passed  out  of  the  soul's  life, 

"  Behold,  all  things  are  become  new." 

And  sadness  as  well  as  joy  has  its  intuitions. 
We  —  I  speak  of  all  faithful  and  mourning 
Christians  —  have  been  instructed  through  our 
very  need  in  what  the  Apostles  learnt  through 
fulness  ;  poverty,  distance,  alienation,  these  states 
have  also  their  deep  experiences,  bringing  truth 
home  into  the  soul.  I  believe  in  conversion 
because  our  Lord  has  said,  "  Except  ye  be  con 
verted,  ye  cannot  enter  the  kingdom  of  heaven." 
I  would  believe  in  it,  if  He  had  not  said  this, 
because  I  know  and  feel  within  myself  that  I 
cannot  enter  it  without  such  a  change.  There 


132  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

is  mystery,  but  no  marvel  in  the  prophetic  an 
nunciation,  "  Ye  shall  not  all  sleep,  but  ye  shall 
all  be  changed."  Who  shall  enter  upon  a  new 
Being  without  being  fitted  for  it  ?  Does  the 
butterfly  soar  without  wings  ?  —  long  fashioned 
in  secret,  though  they  be  long  hidden.  I  claim 
a  new  heart  and  a  new  spirit,  because  God  has 
promised  them.  I  would  claim  them  even  if 
they  had  not  been  promised  by  God,  because 
God  has  given  me  laws  which  I  cannot  keep, 
but  with  other  aids,  other  light,  other  strength 
than  that  which  Nature  furnishes,  —  because  he 
has  given  me  promises  exceeding  great  and  pre 
cious,  which  without  these  I  cannot  enter  upon, 
cannot  even  desire.  For  how,*  saith  the  Al 
mighty,  speaking  to  man  at  the  mouth  of  His 
prophet, 

"  Shall  I  place  thee  among  sons, 
And  give  unto  thee  the  land  of  Desire, 
The  inheritance  of  the  Glory  of  the  Nations?" 

Even  ty  making  us  fit  to  enter  upon  the  joy  which 
He  has  prepared.  "  Thou,  He  says,  shalt  call 
me  My  Father,  and  shalt  not  turn  aside  from 
following  me." 

The  son's  heart  secures  the  son's  portion,  the 
inheritance  is  entailed  upon  the  love.  All  that 
is  won,  all  that  is  lost  in  spiritual  life,  is  lost,  is 

*  Jeremiah  iii.  19. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  133 

won  through  the  heart.*  Here  it  is,  in  the  will, 
the  intellect,  the  affections,  in  that  which  within 
us  is  human,  distinguishing  man  as  man  from 
that  which  is  simply  animal  and  instinctive, 
that  Christ  has  received  a  kingdom  from  His 
Father.  When  He  comes  into  man's  heart, 
into  that  which  inquires,  which  reasons,  which 
loves,  which  suffers,  He  comes  unto  His  own, 
unto  that  which  He  has  made  His  own  through 
the  closest  ties  of  affinity,  the  deepest  experien 
ces  of  anguish.  "  Behold,  He  himself  took  our 
infirmities,  and  bare  our  sicknesses."  He  comes 
unto  that  which  He  alone  understands  in  all  its 
depths,  its  windings,  its  intricacies. 

One  man  may  understand  another  man,  Christ 
understands  Humanity  as  a  whole  ;  but  how 
shall  Humanity  understand  Him?  How  shall 
Man,  even  in  his  own  limited  measure,  appre 
hend  that  for  which  he  himself  has  been  appre 
hended  of  Christ  ?  When  the  intellect  would 
lay  hold  on  these  overwhelming  facts,  —  a  fallen 
world,  a  manifested,  suffering,  dying  God,  a  spir 
itual  Presence  still  living  and  working  among 
us,  —  when  it  would  strive  to  make  these  facts 

*  Look  diligently  what  thou  lovest,  what  thou  fearest,  wherein 
thou  rejoicest  or  art  saddened,  and  under  the  rags  of  conversion 
thou  wilt  find  a  heart  perverted.  The  whole  heart  is  in  these 
four  affections,  and  of  these  I  think  we  must  understand  that 
saying,  Turn  to  the  Lord  with  all  thy  heart.  —  ST.  BERNARD. 


134  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

intelligible  to  itself,  would  endeavour  to  con 
nect  them  with  each  other,  they  elude  it ;  wi 
dening  with  its  grasp,  they  escape  from  it  on 
every  side.  Hence  is  it  that  the  strain,  so  to 
speak,  of  salvation,  has  not  been  laid  by  God 
upon  our  acquiescence  in  any  minutely  devel 
oped  theory,  even  of  Truth  itself,  but  upon 
love  for  one  living  Person,  upon  belief  in  one 
crowning  act. 

Hence  is  it  that,  as  earthly  interests  recede, 
and  eternal  verities  press  and  advance  upon  the 
soul,  the  Cross  comes  into  the  solemn  foreground 
of  spiritual  life,  and  that  Prayer  of  Moses,  the 
Man  of  God,  becomes  so  frequent  on  Christian 
lips,  show  thy  servants  thy  work  !  Not  that  our 
saving  interest  in  Christ  depends  upon  the  clear 
ness  of  our  spiritual  vision,  for  it  is  with  the 
heart  man  believeth  unto  righteousness,  and  the 
heart  may  be  deeply  influenced  by  the  very 
work  with  regard  to  which  its  views  remain 

o 

confused  and  imperfect.*  But  the  fuller  creed 
makes  the  richer  life ;  if  a  little  faith  has  an 
open  door  set  before  it  which  no  man  can  shut, 
an  ample  faith  sets  our  feet  in  the  "  large  pas 
tures  "  that  lie  beyond  it.  And  as  the  grasp 
of  faith  tightens,  its  hold  widens.  If  Christ 
could  say,  when  one  had  but  lightly  touched 

*  Note  K. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  135 

the  hem  of  His  garment,  "  I  perceive  that  vir 
tue  is  gone  out  of  me,"  if  every  spiritual  ap 
proach  to  Him  be  as  the  drawing  forth  of  life 
and  strength,  flowing  out  from  Him  to  us,  how 
is  it  when  Faith  has  made  its  great,  all-inclusive 
seizure,  when  it  has  laid  hold  upon  the  Tree 
whose  every  leaf  is  given  for  the  healing  of  the 
nations  ?  Fear  not,  ye  who  seek  Jesus  who  was 
crucified.  Other  seekers,  other  followers,  may 
after  a  while  turn  back  and  walk  no  more  with 
Him,  but  they  who  have  gone  to  Him  that  they 
may  also  die  with  Him,  can  never  be  offended 
by  word  or  deed  of  His. 

It  is  the  Cross  that  intensifies,  that  glorifies 
life,  that  opens  up  depth  after  depth  in  the  Hu 
man  and  in  the  Divine  Natures,  and  bridges  over 
the  depths  it  has  disclosed.  Here  only,  at  the 
foot  of  the  Cross,  can  man  really  die,  —  here 
only,  with  his  loving,  his  suffering  Lord,  can  he 
lay  down  his  life  that  he  may  receive  it  again  in 
Him.  And  while  the  precepts  of  Christ  are 
reformative,  the  death  of  Christ  is  regenerative ; 
it  has  cast  a  seed  into  the  bosom  of  humanity, 
the  germ  of  a  new,  ever  progressive  life,  —  a 
seed  over  which  Christ  himself  watches,  and 
whose  expansion  in  the  heart,  the  bursting  of  a 
heavenly  midnight-blooming  flower,  is  conver 
sion.  Faith  in  this  great  miracle  makes  all 


136  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

other  miracles  possible.  Show  Thy  servants 
Thy  work,  and  their  own  will  be  indeed  easy,  for 
"  in  the  blood  is  the  life."  We  go  on  asking, 
What  shall  we  do  that  we  may  inherit  eternal 
life  ?  until,  through  the  sudden  shining  of  a 
light  from  heaven,  or  the  gradual  dawning  of  a 
day-star  within  our  hearts,  we  learn  that  our 
part  is  to  live,  to  die,  in  the  strength  of  that 
which  has  been  already  done.  "  Let  him  lay 
hold  of  my  strength,  that  he  may  make  peace 
with  me ;  and  he  shall  make  peace  with  me." 

And  it  is  remarkable  that,  until  through  the 
Spirit  we  feel  Christ  within  us  as  one  that  is 
alive  from  the  dead,  the  fact  of  His  death  seems 
to  affect  us  but  little.  Though  no  sorrow  was 
ever  like  unto  His  sorrow,  it  is  nothing  to  those 
that  pass  by  —  a  story  often  told  —  an  accepted 
history.  Only  to  those  who  believe  is  Christ 
precious,  for  they  only  know  their  Lord  in  the 
fellowship  of  His  sufferings,  in  the  power  of 
His  resurrection.  They  have  looked  upon  Him 
whom  they  beforetime  pierced,  and  He  has 
looked  upon  them,  —  a  mutual  recognition  has 
been  exchanged.  When  Joseph  makes  himself 
known  unto  his  brethren,  their  hard  hearts  are 
smitten. 

And  not  until  then,  —  for  true  self-renuncia 
tion,  much  as  has  been  written  and  said  about 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  137 

it,  is  not  easy.  No  sight,  short  of  that  great 
one  of  Sacrifice  and  Love,  can  turn  the  heart 
from  its  own  works,  the  many  works  through 
which  the  natural  man  will  naturally  seek  to 
propitiate  his  Maker,  to  fix  it  upon  the  one  work, 
through  which  the  spiritual  man  is  aware  that 
his  very  imperfection  is  accepted.  For  all  men 
seek  and  love  their  own ;  the  natural  man 
cleaves  to  his  own  works  and  efforts,  as  being  part 
of  that  body  of  self  which  no  man  ever  yet 
hated ;  and  for  this  natural  adhesion  there  is  no 
escape  save  in  rising  to  a  state  of  being  wherein 
frail,  self-seeking  mortality  is  swallowed  up  in  a 
Divine  life.  Then  being  made  partaker  of  a 
life  in  which  Christ  is  his  own,  it  becomes  nat 
ural,  and,  as  it  were,  an  instinct,  to  love  and 
cleave  to  Him.  It  is  the  soul's  natural  life. 

The  soul  that  has  thus  returned  to  its  true 
gravitation  *  has  done  alike  with  task-work  and 
with  anxiety,  has  ceased  from  that  sad  complaint, 
"  Thou  hast  left  me  to  serve  alone."  It  is  no 
longer  cumbered  with  much  serving :  no  longer 
solicitous  about  its  work,  but  about  its  life,  the 
life  of  Christ  within  it,  of  which  that  work  is 
but  the  blossoming  and  expansion.  So  long  as 

*  All  things  in  nature  are  moved  and  brought  to  their  proper 
place  by  their  gravity,  the  light  upwards,  the  heavy  downwards, 
but  the  gravitation  of  the  rational  soul  is  love,  the  first  and  proper 
motive  which  inclines  the  will  to  its  object.  —  John  of  Gech. 


138  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

it  is  planted  beside  that  River  of  water,  neither 
flower  nor  fruit  will  fail  in  their  season.  "  He 
that  abideth  in  me  and  I  in  Him,  the  same 
bringeth  forth  much  fruit." 

For  though  it  be  possible,  as  appears  from  St. 
Paul's  warning,  for  an  unholy  heart  to  obtain 
a  perception  of  the  salvation  which  Christ  has 
wrought,  such  a  perception  will  be  ever  unac 
companied  by  any  renewing,  vivifying  change 
of  aim  and  of  affection.  The  holders  of  the 
Truth  in  unrighteousness  only  hold  it  as  a  de 
tached  thing ;  it  has  no  hold  upon  them,  nor 
root  wherefrom  to  put  forth  its  transformative 
energy.  Even  in  Christ's  light  they  do  not  see 
light,  because  they  do  not  love  it.  Yet  this 
barren,  lifeless  faith  is  not  to  be  opposed,  as  has 
been  sometimes  attempted,  by  any  doctrine  of 
Works,  dead,  save  in  so  far  as  they  flow  out  of 
the  fulness  of  the  living  Vine.  This  is  to  look  for 
fruit  from  the  tree  of  self,  withered  from  its  very 
root.  From  me,  saith  Christ,  is  thy  fruit  found. 
For  dead  faith  and  dead  works  there  remains  a 
common  antidote,  conversion,  that  living  faith 
in  a  living  Saviour  which  works  within  us  a  real 

O 

change,  f  "  so  that  we,  beholding  his  glory,  are 
changed  from  glory  to  glory,  even  by  the  Spirit 
of  the  Lord:' 

*  Note  L. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  139 

And  it  is  evident  that  an  inward  change,  a 
change  in  ourselves,  is  needed  before  we  even 
can  appreciate  our  Saviour's  outward  work. 
The  dead  bury  their  dead,  the  living  live  unto 
Him  who  liveth  and  was  dead,  and  is  alive  for 
evermore.  I  would  illustrate  what  I  mean  by 
saying  that  our  Saviour's  work,  the  work  of 
which  He  said  upon  the  cross,  "  It  is  finished," 
is  like  a  perfect  globe,  complete  in  itself  as  one 
of  the  planets  of  our  system,  but  we  do  not  see 
what  it  is  until  the  Spirit  moves  from  point  to 
point  of  the  darkened  disk,  and  all  becomes  lu 
minous.  When  He,  saith  our  Lord,  the  Spirit 
of  Truth,  is  come,  He  shall  take  of  mine,  and 
show  it  unto  you.  Is  there  not  something  very 
remarkable  in  this  saying  and  in  the  words  that 
follow  it,  —  "  He  shall  not  speak  of  Himself,  he 
shall  glorify  Me  "  ?  As  the  Son's  work  upon 
earth  was  to  manifest  His  Father  unto  the  world, 
as  He  spake  not  His  own  words  nor  followed 
out  His  own  will,  even  so  is  the  Blessed  Spirit 
occupied  only  with  the  words  and  will  of  Him 
that  sent  Him.  He  speaks  not  of  Himself,  He 
has,  as  it  were,  no  new  thing  to  impart,  but 
rather  to  make  all  things  new,  by  setting  the 
things  of  Heaven  before  the  soul  in  that  light 
of  Heaven  by  which  alone  they  can  be  read 
aright. 


140  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

"There  is  a  spirit  in  man,"  a  principle  of  life 
within  us,  wrapped  like  the  fire  within  the  flint, 
in  sleep  and  darkness,  until  the  powerful  attrac 
tion  of  God's  blessed  Spirit,  "  that  inspiration 
of  the  Almighty  which  giveth  understanding," 
comes  to  quicken  it.  For  we  must  remember 
that  in  spiritual  things  every  increase  of  knowl 
edge,  every  expansion  of  love,  partakes  of  the 
nature  of  a  manifestation.  It  is  a  discovery  of 
Grod  unto  the  soul  to  which  it  could  never  have 
attained  through  its  own  efforts.  Spiritual  illu 
mination  is  the  unsealing  of  the  soul's  eye,  en 
abling  it  to  behold  that  which  actually  exists. 

"  The  lightning's  flash  did  not  create 

The  lovely  prospect  it  revealed, 
It  only  showed  the  real  stale 

Of  what  the  darkness  had  concealed.11 

Also  must  we  guard  against  an  idea  which  is 
apt  to  mix  itself  in  our  conceptions  of  God's 
dealings  with  man,  —  I  mean  that  of  looking 
upon  them,  whether  general .  or  individual,  as 
being  connected  with  some  change  in  Him.* 
Known  unto  God  are  all  His  works  from  the 

*  It  is  not  God,  but  Man,  that  is  changed  by  our  Saviour's 
death ;  it  is  not  necessary  for  our  reparation  that  a  change  be 
wrought  upon  Him,  but  upon  us,  seeing  that  it  is  not  God,  but 
Man,  that  has  lost  His  goodness.  Christ  came  into  the  world,  not 
to  make  God  better,  but  to  make  us  better;  nor  did  he  die  to 
make  Him  more  disposed  to  do  good,  but  to  dispose  us  to  receive 
it.  —  Baxter. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  HI 

foundation  of  the  world.  He  loved  the  world 
before  He  made  known  that  love  in  its  crowning 
manifestation.  What  is  the  life  and  death  of 
Jesus  Christ  but  the  showing,  what  is  the  Gos 
pel  but  the  telling,  of  this  love  ?  —  a  love  from 
the  beginning  yearning  over  its  object,  yet  with 
drawing  from  it  as  Joseph  did  from  his  brethren, 
—  a  love  revealing  itself  at  long  intervals,  in 
dark  utterances,  speaking  to  man  through  tho 
cloud  and  the  fiery  pillar,  yet  now  showing  us 
plainly  of  the  Father  in  the  intelligible  language 
of  a  deed,  — "  Greater  love  than  this  hath  no 
man,  that  a  man  lay  down  his  life  for  his 
friends." 

So  hath  God  loved  the  world,  keeping  back 
some  better  thing  in  store,  reserving  Love's 
final  proof,  its  blest  Epiphany,  until  the  fulness 
of  His  own  time  came  in ;  even  so  He  loves 
the  soul  before,  through  "  loving-kindness,"  He 
so  imparts  that  love  as  to  enable  the,  soul  to 
return  it.  For  until  we  have  felt  God  to  be 
loving,  we  cannot  acknowledge  Him  to  be  love. 
St.  John  tells  us  explicitly,  He  that  loveth  not 
knoweth  not  God.  The  knowledge  of  God  as 
described  to  us  in  Scripture  is  no  cold,  intel 
lectual  estimate  of  His  perfections,  but  rather 
that  intimate  delighting  in  them,  that  power 
fully  felt  attraction,  which  makes  the  very 


142  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

expressions  of  knowledge  and  love  as  applied 
to  man's  communion  with  his  Maker  inter 
changeable.  We  often  say  of  earthly  things, 

"  That  we  must  love  them  ere  we  know 
That  they  are  worthy  to  be  loved." 

We  may  confess  of  many  things  and  of  many 
people  that  they  are  indeed  lovely  and  desira 
ble,  but  what  are  they  to  us  until  the  heart  has 
taught  us  at  once  our  own  need  and  their  ex 
ceeding  worth  and  value  ? 

& 

And  even  thus,  though  after  a  manner  un 
recognizable  to  human  sense,  we  need  to  be 
"  drawn "  to  God.  He  whom  no  man  hath 
seen,  nor  can  see  at  any  time,  can  only  become 
the  delight  and  desire  of  the  soul,  according  to 
the  degree  in  which  He  is  pleased  to  reveal 
unto  it  His  beauty,  and  impart  unto  it  the  sense 
of  His  satisfying  goodness.  We  can  only  love 
God  according  to  the  measure  in  which  we 
know  and  are  known  of  Him.  But  is  this 
measure  a  fixed  one  ? 

Surely,  far  otherwise ;  yet  it  is  no  uncommon 
thing  to  hear  well-disposed  people  lament  their 
own  conscious  deadness  and  deficiency,  in  terms 
which  imply  that  they  look  upon  this  holy 
affection  rather  in  the  light  of  a  natural  faculty, 
which  one  person  may  be  so  happy  as  to  possess 
and  another  be  innocently  devoid  of,  than  as  a 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  143 

state  of  being  to  be  attained  to  through  the  im 
provement  of  a  supernatural  gift.  Yet  if  fixed 
principles  of  attraction  and  repulsion  are  as 
unceasingly  at  work  within  God's  spiritual 
kingdom  as  within  His  natural  world,*  —  if 
there  is  a  correspondency  between  the  mani 
festation  of  God's  love  and  our  "  continuing " 
in  what  has  been  already  imparted,  it  is  evident 
that  all  who  truly  wish  to  love  God  better  may 
do  so.  Our  Saviour,  that  great  master  of 
Love's  secrets,  that  Divine  expounder  of  its 
Sentences,  has  not  placed  its  essence,  its  ex 
pression,  in  things  to  which  man's  feeble,  op 
pressed  nature  is  not  at  all  times  equal ;  in 
tears,  in  aspirations,  in  passionate  outpourings 
of  the  spirit ;  He  has  not  sent  us  to  the  heaven 
of  fervent  rapture  when  we  would  bring  Him 
down  from  above,  neither  to  the  Deep  of  an 
guish  and  tribulation  when  we  would  raise  Him 
once  more  from  the  dead  in  our  cold,  decaying 

*  An  analogy  for  what  is  here  intended  may  be  found  in  the 
causes  which  prevent  vegetation  in  the  desert.  (See  Humboldt's 
Aspects  of  Nature.)  Vast  sandy  plains  are  dry  because  little  rain 
falls  upon  them,  and  little  rain  falls  upon  them  because  they  are  so 
dry,  columns  of  heated  air  rushing  up  to  disperse  the  vapors  that 
would  otherwise  descend.  Because  there  is  no  moisture  beneath, 
there  is  no  rain  from  above.  Often,  doubtless,  would  God  send 
a  gracious  rain  upon  His  inheritance  and  refresh  it  when  it  is 
weary,  were  not  the  clouds  ready  to  break  in  fatness  stayed  by 
aridity  below. 


144  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

hearts.  But  He  has  bid  us  keep  within  the 
way,  the  way  within  which  "  no  wayfaring 
man  "  of  humble  and  sincere  heart  "  ever  yet 
erred,"  grievously  as  his  course  might  be  beset 
and  hindered.  He  has  said,  "If  ye  love  me,  ye 
will  keep  my  commandments"  We  are  surely 
too  much  in  the  habit  of  looking  upon  this  espe 
cial  gift  of  God's  Spirit,  "  this  unction  from  the 
Holy  One,  through  whicli  we  understand  all 
things,"  as  a  mere  affair  of  temperament,  con 
founding  it  with  that,  in  which,  as  in  a  soil 
more  or  less  favorable,  it  takes  root,  —  the 
degree  of  religious  receptivity,  which  varies  so 
much  in  different  individuals,  even  in  different 
races  of  men.  Yet  spiritualized  conceptions, 
fervid  feelings,  all  which  we  include  within  the 
depth  and  range  of  susceptibility  to  devout  im 
pressions,  are  but  the  element  through  which 
the  flame  diffuses  itself;  did  it  consist  in  these, 
it  would  be  a  phosphorescence,  lacking  the  hid 
den  principle  of  heat  which  makes  it  indeed  "  a 
fire,"  substantive  and  real  as  the  object  upon 
which  it  feeds. 

"  To  him  that  hath  shall  be  given,  and  he 
shall  have  more  abundantly."  We  have  here  a 
sure  word  of  promise  ;  a  prophecy  fulfilling 
itself  in  the  Christian  life  so  constantly,  so  qui 
etly,  that  its  accomplishment  cometh  not  with 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  145 

observation.  Since  our  Lord,  in  taking  our  na 
ture  upon  Himself,  drew  it  back  with  Him  into 
the  bosom  of  His  Father's  love,  there  has  arisen 
a  bond  between  our  common  Humanity  and 
God,  even  the  bands  of  love,  the  cords  of  a 
man,  which  we  as  individuals  may  tighten  or 
relax.  You  speak,  in  one  of  your  letters,  "  of 
a  self-regulation  upon  God's  Law,  which,  in  its 
co-operation  with  the  purifying  grace  of  His 
Spirit,  is  as  the  cleansing  of  the  dust  from  the 
soul's  windows,  letting  the  sun's  rays  stream  in 
and  penetrate  its  remotest  corners,  —  or  like 
the  deepening  of  the  channel  of  a  river  by 
clearing  away  its  stones  and  mud,  which  is  fol 
lowed  by  a  fuller  rush  of  waters."*  St.  Peter 
speaks  plainly  of  the  Holy  Spirit  as  that  which 
God  hath  given  to  those  who  obey  Him,f  and 
how  many  are  the  Scriptures  which  make  us 
aware  that  there  are,  on  our  part,  endeavors 
of  which  the  Lord  is  mindful,  attitudes  to  which 
He  is  ever  favorable,  mental  characteristics,  in 
themselves  so  pleasing  to  Him  that  He  has  said 
of  the  place  where  they  are  found,  "  Here  will 
I  dwell,  for  I  have  a  delight  therein." 

And  hence  there  arises  within  the  renewed 

*  To  this  point  tends  the  Prophet's  admonition,  "  Sow  in  right 
eousness,  reap  in  mercy." 
t  Acts  v.  32. 

7  j 


146  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

soul  a  secret,  continual  thirst,  at  once  after  holi 
ness  and  after  grace.  "  Let  thy  garments  be 
always  white,  neither  let  thy  head  lack  oint 
ment."  It  covets  earnestly  these  best  gifts, 
these  holy  dispositions,  both  as  marks  of  the 
Divine  favor  and  improvable  pledges  of  its 
countenance.  For  these  jewels  have  an  in 
herent  magnetism,  attracting  even  while  they 
adorn ;  each  fits  the  soul  for  that  which  it 
-draws  down  upon  it,  a  further  communication 
-of  Divine  Favor.  In  the  Beatitudes  we  see 
this  correspondency  drawn  out  in  strongly 
marked  antithesis,  but  all  Scripture  witnesses 
to  it,  making  us  aware  of  a  sure  connection  be 
tween  Faith  and  the  putting  forth  of  Almighty 
power ;  between  purity  and  the  seeing  of  God  ; 
meekness  and  the  indwelling  of  His  Spirit ; 
between  the  denying  for  conscience'  sake  of 
earthly  desires,  and  the  implanting  of  heavenly 
affections  ;  between  the  dedication  of  the  heart 
to  God,  and  the  enlightenment  of  the  mind  by 
Him. 

And  blessed  is  he  who  in  any  one  of  these, 
even  in  that  which  is  least,  has  been  found  faith 
ful  to  that  which  he  has  received  of  God  !  For 
as  with  the  gifts,  so  it  is  with  the  Giver  who  is 
to  be  desired  above  them  all.  In  the  soul  that 
would  receive  Him  there  must  be  a  preparedness, 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  147 

—  an  unwrought  conformity  to  which  the 
Psalmist  confesses  in  inquiring,  "  When  wilt 
thou  come  unto  me  ?  I  will  walk  in  my  house 
with  a  perfect  heart."  My  times,  he  would 
say,  are  in  Thy  Hand  ;  I  must  wait  for  a  season 
of  refreshing,  yet  he  waits  in  an  outward 
obedience  of  which  the  life-pulse  is  an  inner 
consciousness  that  the  Lord  is  good  to  them 
that  wait  for  Him,  to  the  soul  that  diligently 
seeketh  Him. 

"  We  wait,  O  Lord,  for  thy  loving-kindness 
in  the  midst  of  thy  temple."  There  is  so  much 
in  the  Gospel  that  peculiarly  addresses  itself  to 
transgressors,  that  we  are  apt,  in  the  attractive 
tenderness  of  its  appeals  to  such  as  are  ignorant 
and  "  out  of  the  way,"  to  lose  sight  of  the  fact 
that  through  its  blessed  revelations  lio;lit  has 

O  O 

sprung  up  for  the  righteous,  and  joyful  gladness 
for  them  that  are  true  of  heart.  Thou  meetest, 
saith  the  Prophet,  him  that  rejoiceth  and 
worketh  righteousness,  those  that  remember  Ttiee 
in  their  ivays.  And  it  is  surely  remarkable 
that  the  earliest  manifestations  of  the  conso 
lation  for  which  Israel  waited  were  vouchsafed 
to  "  Israelites  indeed."  The  first  droppings  of 
the  shower  of  freenesses  fell  not  upon  the  dwell 
ers  in  the  wilderness,  but  upon  a  field  which 
the  Lord  had  already  blessed,  upon  just  and 


148  A   PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

devout  persons  walking  in  the  ordinances  of  the 
Lord  blameless,  living  up  to  the  light  which 
they  then  enjoyed.  Such  were  Mary  and 
Joseph,  Zacharias  and  Elisabeth,  Simon  and 
Anna  the  Prophetess ;  such  too  in  the  Gentile 
world  was  he  to  whom  the  words  whereby  that 
world  should  be  saved  were  first  declared.  The 
prayers  and  alms  of  the  good  Cornelius  *  had 
already  come  up  as  a  memorial  before  God,  and 

*  In  how  many  of  these  righteous  persons  was  that  question  of 
the  Prophet's  answered,  "  Do  not  my  words  do  good  to  him  that 
walketh  uprightly?  "  Among  these  humble  askers  and  seekers, 
flowing  quietly  along  in  the  channel  where  they  were  to  be  over 
taken  by  the  waters  of  grace,  the  Eunuch  of  Queen  Candace 
seems  an  affecting  instance;  and  how  much  may  we  learn  of 
God's  attitude  towards  such  righteous  waiting  souls,  from  the 
few  words  which  the  Spirit  spake  unto  Philip,  "  Go  and  join  thy 
self  to  that  chariot."  Go  and  join  thyself!  There  sat  that  hon 
est,  God-fearing,  but  still  ignorant  man,  reading  Esaias.  The 
whole  account  is  full  of  a  heavenly  poetry,  —  how  he  diligently 
read  the  passage,  "  He  was  led  as  a  lamb  to  the  slaughter  " ;  and 
then  his  question,  showing  such  total  darkness  on  the  subject, 
"  Of  whom  spake  the  Prophet  this;  of  himself,  or  of  some  other 
man?  "  — a  simple,  honest  question,  to  which  God  sent  the  answer, 
and  with  it,  His  eternal  salvation.  Who  knows  how  long  the 
Ethiopian  may  have  served  the  true  God;  he  had  come  a  long 
way  to  visit  the  Temple,  the  place  where  He  dwelt. 

Have  you  ever  seen  your  servants  sitting  down  on  a  Sunday 
afternoon  to  read  "  a  lesson,"  perhaps  from  a  religious  book  which 
they  do  not  understand,  in  perfect  good  faith  that  the  lesson  does 
them  good?  I  feel  a  yearning  over  such,  —  a  desire  that  they 
should  possess  the  unknown  good  they  ignorantly  hope  for,  —  as 
St.  Paul  declared  to  the  Athenians  the  unknown  God  whom  they 
ignorantly  worshipped.  —  J.  E.  B. 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  149 

in  the  joy  of  those  glad  tidings  which  reached 
him,  that  unto  the  Gentiles  also  was  granted 
repentance  unto  life,  wras  mixed  a  peculiar  per 
sonal  encouragement,  like  that  which  was  of  old 
extended  to  one  greatly  beloved.  "  Fear  not," 
said  the  angel  commissioned  to  impart  so  many 
wonders  unto  Daniel,  "  for  from  the  first  day 
that  thou  didst  set  thy  heart  to  understand  and 
to  chasten  thyself  before  thy  God,  thy  words 
were  heard,  and  lam  come  for  thy  words" 

And  even  now,  though  it  be  no  longer  sent 
to  us  by  the  hand  of  saint  or  angel,  the  keeping 
of  the  commandment  hath  great  reward.  Many 
anxious  and  honest  Christians  may  be  yet  con 
sciously  far  from  the  spiritual  haven  where  they 
would  be.  Let  such  be  consoled  in  remember 
ing  that  the  Father  who  draws  us  unto  Christ 
beholds  us,  yea,  sets  forth  to  meet  us  "  while 
we  are  yet  a  great  way  off."  A  great  way  off, 
and  yet  upon  the  way,  —  herein  lies  all  the 
difference  between  resistance  and  returning,  be 
tween  the  temper  to  which  God  inclines  and 
that  against  which  He  fights  with  the  sword  of 
His  mouth.  We  may  be  far  as  yet  from  the 
robe  and  ring,  from  the  kiss  of  perfect  recon 
ciliation,  still  farther  from  the  hearing  of  that 
saying,  "  Son,  thou  art  ever  with  me,  and  all  that 
I  have  is  thine"  yet  we  may  be  in  the  way  that 


150  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

leadeth  to  a  kingdom.  Of  this,  we  can  have 
no  more  affecting  instance  than  the  case  of  the 
Disciples.  How  much  they  loved  their  Lord, 
how  little  they  understood  Him  !  They  seem, 
like  the  multitudes  who  marvelled  at  the  gra 
cious  words  that  came  out  of  His  mouth,  to  have 
felt  an  attraction  towards  His  teaching,  without 
perceiving  its  true  import ;  for  how  little  while 
their  Lord  was  with  them  do  they  appear  to 
have  caught  of  His  Spirit,  or  to  have  become 
aware  of  the  nature  of  His  appointed  work ! 
This  is  shown  in  so  many  parts  of  the  sacred 
story,  that  it  would  be  but  tedious  to  multiply 
instances  to  prove  that  it  was  upon  a  kingdom 
of  this  world,  and  the  power  and  glory  belong 
ing  to  such,  that  their  desires  were  set,  their 
requests  founded,  —  desires  yet  to  be  fulfilled, 
requests  yet  to  be  granted  far  more  fully  than 
they  were  then  capable  of  realizing.  "  Ye  shall 
indeed  drink  of  my  cup"  Their  faith,  though 
imperfect  in  its  scope,  was  sincere  in  its  nature, 
and  it  did  not  lose  its  reward.  They  trusted 
that  it  was  He  who  should  redeem  Israel,  and 
having  an  eye  to  Him,  they  were  lightened, 
and  their  faces  were  not  ashamed. 

And  so  will  it  be  with  us.  They  who,  con 
tinuing  faithful  to  Divine  Grace,  however  par 
tially  communicated,  serve  God  with  their  whole 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  151 

lives,  will  never  fail  of  that  one  reward,  the 
greatest  which  even  He  has  to  bestow,  the  be 
ing  made  able  to  love  Him  with  their  whole 
hearts.  If  we  follow  our  Lord's  footsteps  hum 
bly  and  patiently  along  the  common  road,  He 
will  take  us,  as  He  did  the  three  favored 
Disciples,  witli  Him  upon  the  Mount,  and  show 
us  Moses  and  Elias,  the  hard  sayings  of  the 
law,  the  deep  enigmatical  oracles  of  life,  trans 
figured  in  Himself.  Our  eyes  will  be  no  more 
holden,  and  the  exclamation  of  our  souls  will 
be,  "  Hast  Thou  been  so  long  time  with  me, 
Lord,  and  I  have  not  known  Thee  ?  " 

Do  you  remember  Bunyan's  quaint  and  beau 
tiful  description  of  the  Land  of  Beulah,  a  coun 
try  situated  on  this  side  of  the  River  of  Death, 
where  the  sun  shineth  night  and  day,  and  where 
Pilgrims  may  rest  and  rejoice  safely,  their  King 
having  brought  them  to  His  Banqueting  House, 
where  His  banner  over  them  is  love  ?  The 
heart,  as  it  advances  in  Christ,  seems  to  reach 
out  towards  this  inward  Millennium,  this  Messi 
anic  reign  of  rest  and  fulness,  the  kiss  of  right 
eousness  and  peace  within  the  soul.  It  wearies 
of  that  order  of  things  in  which  there  is  a  con 
tinual  effort,  —  a  struggle,  a  Law  in  the  mem 
bers  warring  against  the  Law  of  God,  and 
desires  to  escape  from  it  into  the  freedom*  to 
*  See  Note  M. 


152  A   PRESENT  HEA  YEN. 

which  Christ  has  called  us,  the  state  in  which 
this  law  is  no  more  coercive,  having  become  the 
law  of  these  very  members,  the  principle  by  ivhich 
they  naturally  act.  A  state  whose  characteristic 
is  not  Law,  but  the  liberty  which  exists  under 
such  a  law  as  that,  which  "  being  perfect  "  is 
endued  with  power  to  "  convert "  the  soul. 

And  if  we  pass  but  slowly  into  this  liberty, 
if,  as  you  say,  some  of  those  who  we  may  hope 
arrive  at  the  Holy  City  in  safety  seem  to  miss 
the  Land  of  Beulah  on  their  way,  —  to  know 
much  of  the  conflicts  and  struggles  incident  to 
our  Christian  calling,  little  of  its  rest  and  sat 
isfaction,  —  this  need  scarcely  be  wondered  at, 
"for  there  are  many  adversaries."  The  prin 
ciple  of  Life  within  us  has  much  to  contend 
with  from  inward  and  outward  hinderance,  — 
the  imperishable  seed  lives  in  many  a  spiritual 
conception,  many  a  heavenly  disposition  that  is 
not  yet  strong  enough  to  detach  itself  from 
earthly  obstructions,  so  that,  lifted  into  a  re 
gion  where  it  feels  the  sunshine  of  love  upon 
its  leaves,  it  bursts  into  flower  and  fragrance. 
Yet,  while  we  were  yet  without  strength,  Christ 
died  for  the  ungodly.  Decay,  infirmity,  cir 
cumstance,  all  that  under  which  we  do  and 
must  groan,  being  burdened,  —  what  matter  if 
these  overcome  us,  so  that  we  overcome  them 
through  Him  who  loveth  us.  "  A  troop  shall 


A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.  153 

overcome  Him,"  it  was  spoken  of  Gad,  "  but 
He  shall  overcome  at  the  last."  Much  bloom, 
much  sweetness,  much  usefulness,  may  be  tram 
pled  out  of  our  hearts  and  lives,  without  any 
moral  cession,  —  this  alone  can  separate  us  from 
the  love  of  Christ ;  comforted  or  uncomforted, 
so  long  as  our  hearts,  our  wills,  are  steadfast,  we 
can  still  be  His  sad,  true  lovers.  The  blossom 
of  early  hope  falls  off,  the  fruit  of  performance 
does  not  ripen  perfectly  ;  it  is  the  green  initial, 
the  will,  that  which  we  would  fain  be,  which 
Christ  looks  for,  and,  coming,  desires  to  find. 

Of  many  a  rooted  and  grounded  soul  the 
bloom-time  lies  possibly  beyond  the  grave.  Yet 
the  Believer  must  be  ever  solicitous  of  victory  ;  * 
—  ever  desirous  to  win,  f  to  hold  his  ground  in 
a  humble  way,  to  let  the  enemy  gain  no  advan 
tage.  We  should  love,  we  should  ardently 
aspire  to,  the  lowly,  sorrowful  triumphs  of 
Christ,  the  calm  persistence  in  known  duties, 

*  "  It  was  spiritual  death  which  Christ  conquered,  so  that  at 
the  last  it  shall  be  swallowed  up,  —  mark  the  word,  —  not  in  life, 
but  in  victory.  As  the  dead  body  shall  be  raised  to  life,  so  also 
shall  the  defeated  soul  to  victory,  if  only  it  has  been  fighting  on 
its  Master's  side,  has  made  no  covenant  with  death,  nor  itself  bowed 
its  forehead  to  its  seal.  Blind  from  the  prison-house,  maimed 
from  the  battle,  or  mad  from  the  tombs,  their  souls  shall  surely 
yet  sit  astonished  at  His  feet  who  giveth  peace."  —  RUSKIN. 

t  Often,  says  De  Maistre,  in  a  real  battle,  the  losses  on  either 
side  seem  equal.  Who  does  win  ?  He  who  keeps  possession  of  Hie 

*"  7* 


154  A  PRESENT  HEAVEN. 

the  readiness  to  begin  all  over  again,  —  to  see 
the  cherished  plan,  even  the  cherished  prayer, 
defeated.  Death,  the  death  of  hope,  of  endeav 
or,  will  yet  be  swallowed  up  in  victory ;  — 

"  Thy  dead  men  shall  live, 
With  my  dead  body  shall  they  arise." 

Christ's  final  Triumph  is  secure,  and  with  Him 
the  triumph  of  all  that  has  been  indeed  His. 
When  St.  Paul  predicts  that  Christ  shall  reign 
until  He  have  subdued  all  things  under  His  feet, 
He  adds  emphatically,  '*  Now  the  last  enemy 
that  shall  be  destroyed  is  Death'''  It  is  impos 
sible  that  these  words  should  be  spoken  of  nat 
ural  dissolution  only.  They  refer  to  the  whole 
of  that  dark  empire  of  which  the  death  of  the 
body  is  but  a  part,  and  of  this  as  a  whole  Christ 
is  the  conqueror.  Behold,  let  us  therefore  go 
to  Him  that  we  may  also  die  with  Him  ;  let  us 
die  with  Him,  that  we  may  also  live  with  Him ; 
let  us  suffer  with  Him,  that  we  may  also  reign 
with  Him  ;  let  us  not  in  word,  in  thought,  in  life, 
deny  Him  who  abideth  faithful,  who  cannot  deny 
Himself. 

"  And  on  His  Head  were  many  crowns. 
"  And  He  was  clothed  in  a  vesture  dipped  in  blood; 
"  And  the  armies  which  were  in  Heaven  followed  Him,  — 
clothed  in  fine  linen,  white  and  clean." 


r 


NOTES 


NOTES. 


tidings 


NOTE  A.  —  Page  13. 

AY  we  not  say  that  the  Gospel  —  the 
simplest  sense  of  a  word  being  always  its 
truest  one  —  is  considered  and  preached 
too  little  in  its  primary  meaning,  "  glad 
The  characteristic  office  of  an  evangelist, 
as  distinguished  from  that  of  a  teacher,  is  that  of  a 
herald  or  proclaimer.  He  is  one  who  bringeth  good 
tidings.  In  classical  language  (see  Olshausen,  Vol.  I. 
p.  3)  the  word  Evangelium  was  also  used  to  signify 
a  reward  or  present  given  to  a  person  bringing  a 
piece  of  good  news,  making  him  a  sharer  in  the 
gladness  he  imparted.  Thus,  while  the  Gospel,  like 
Him  of  whom  it  testifies,  places  its  work  before  it,  it 
also  brings  its  reward  with  it  (Isa.  xl.  10,  and  Ixii. 
11),  being  its  own  and  exceeding  great  reward.  The 
Gospel  is  a  gift,  —  one  of  those  which  our  Lord, 
having  ascended  up  on  high,  received  for  us  men, — 
an  acquisition,  a  blessing  making  rich,  a  thing  to  be 


158  NOTES. 

rejoiced  over,  —  good  news,  in  short,  and  to  be  wel 
comed  as  such,  and  not  good  advice  only.  See  on  this 
subject  a  beautiful  tract,  "  The  Ship  of  Heaven." 


NOTE  B.  — Page  16. 

WE  may  apply  to  Faith  what  St.  Augustine 
says  of  its  companion :  —  "Is  love  made 
perfect  the  moment  it  is  born  ?  so  far  from  it,  it  is 
born  in  order  that  it  may  be  brought  to  perfection. 
When  it  has  been  born,  it  is  nourished  ;  when  it  has 
been  nourished,  it  is  strengthened  ;  when  it  has  been 
strengthened,  it  is  made  perfect.  When  it  has  ar 
rived  at  perfection,  it  says,  '  I  desire  to  depart  and  to 
be  with  Christ.' " 


NOTE  C.  —  Page  35. 

without  Faith  we  cannot  be  saved,  for 
we  cannot  rightly  serve  God  unless  we  love 
Him,  and  we  cannot  love  Him  unless  we  know  Him, 
neither  can  we  know  God  unless  by  Faith.  There 
fore,  salvation  by  Faith  is  only,  in  other  words,  the 
love  of  God  by  the  knowledge  of  God,  or  the  recovery 
of  the  image  of  God  by  a  true  spiritual  acquaintance 
with  Him. 

"  Would  you  then  be  freed  from  the  bondage  of 


NOTES.  159 

corruption?  would  you  grow  in  grace,  in  grace  in 
general,  or  in  any  grace  in  particular  ?  If  you  would, 
your  way  is  plain.  Ask  from  God  more  faith;  beg 
of  Him,  morning,  noon,  and  night,  while  you  walk 
by  the  way,  while  you  sit  in  the  house,  when  you  lie 
down,  and  when  you  rise  up,  —  beg  of  Him  simply 
to  impress  Divine  things  more  deeply  on  your  heart, 
—  to  give  you  more  and  more  of  the  substance  of 
things  hoped  for,  the  evidence  of  things  not  seen."  — 
JOHN  WESLEY. 


NOTE  D.  —  Page  43. 

AN  idea,  according  to  the  vigor  with  which  it  is 
conceived  or  realized,  will  quickly  or  slowly 
prepare  for  itself  a  body,  and  pass  into  a  fact.  When 
once  it  has  established  its  empire  within  the  mind,  it 
will  not  be  long  in  bringing  outward  things  under  its 
jurisdiction. 

"  J'entends,  par  la  foi,  cette  confiance  dans  la  ve'rite 
qui  fait  que  non  seulement  on  la  tient  pour  vrai,  et 
que  1'intelligence  en  est  satisfaite  ;  mais  qu'on  a  con- 
fiance  dans  son  droit  de  regner  sur  le  monde,  de 
gouverner  les  faits,  et  dans  sa  puissance  pour  y 
re*ussir. 

"  C'est  dans  ce  sentiment  qu'une  fois  entre  en  pos 
session  de  la  verite,  1'homme  se  sent  appele  a  la  faire 
passer  dans  les  faits  exterieurs,  a  les  reformer,  a  les 
regler  selon  la  raison."  —  GUIZOT. 


160  NOTES. 


NOTE  E.  — Pages  51,  57. 

ELIGION  stands  upon  two  pillars,  namely, 
what  Christ  did  for  us  in  His  flesh,  and  what 
He  performs  in  us  by  His  Spirit.  Most  errors  arise 
from  an  attempt  to  separate  these  two."  —  NEWTON. 


NOTE  F.  — Page  67. 

WE  may  learn  something  by  considering  the 
sense  in  which  the  Apostles  use  the  word 
Saint ;  as  when  St.  Paul  addressed  a  whole  Church, 
"  Even  all  that  be  at  Rome,"  as  having  received 
grace  and  apostleship,  called  to  be  Saints  ;  and  thus 
opens  another  epistle,  "  To  the  Church  of  God  which 
is  at  Corinth,  called  to  be  Saints,  with  all  who  in 
every  place  call  upon  the  Lord  Jesus,  both  theirs  and 
ours."  The  word  as  they  employ  it  confers  no  pecu 
liar  distinction ;  it  is  not,  as  it  has  become  with  us,  a 
Title  of  Honor,  but  the  badge  of  simple  citizenship  in 
Christ,  being  applied  to  all  who  remain  faithful  to  the 
spiritual  relations  in  which  they  have  been  placed  by 
Him. 

It  is  a  Family  Name,  not  acquired,  but  inherited, 
and  as  such  testifies,  not  to  eminence  of  personal 
grace,  or  loftiness  of  individual  achievement,  but  to 
union  with  the  Holiness  of  which  they  who  bear  it 
have  been  made  partakers.  To  be  a  Saint,  in  the 


NOTES.  161 

sense  in  which  they  use  the  word,  is  to  be,  not  such 
a  one  as  some  Christian  men  and  women  raised 
up  by  God  for  especial  ends  have  been,  but  such  a 
one  as  all  Christian  men  and  women  may  be.  To  be 
a  Saint  is  simply  to  be  a  man  in  Christ ;  it  is  the 
growing  up  unto  Him  who  is  our  Head  in  all  things, 
it  is  the  feeding  upon  the  Bread  which  came  down 
from  Heaven,  through  privileges  which  are  open,  and 
through  duties  which  are  common  to  all. 

When  we  restrict  the  idea  of  Saintship  to  those 
eminent  spirits,  the  burning  and  shining  lights  in 
which  we  are  permitted  from  time  to  time  to  rejoice, 
we  betray  that  our  notion  of  sanctity  is  placed  rather 
in  things  accidental  to  the  renewed  character,  than  in 
that  which  is  its  essence.  Zeal,  fervor,  learning, 
and  eloquence  devoted  to  the  holiest  purposes ;  the 
power  of  subjecting  men's  spirits,  or  of  calling  down 
upon  them  the  refreshing  from  above,  —  these  things 
do  not  make  the  Saint,  they  only  adorn  him.  These 
are  but  the  gifts  laid  upon  the  altar.  "It  is  the 
altar  which  sanctifies  the  gift,"  and  of  that  altar  all 
are  partakers. 

To  recognize  the  privileges  of  our  high  yet  com 
mon  calling  is  to  understand  that  a  man  is  not  a 
Saint  in  virtue  of  anything  which  separates  him  from 
his  Brethren,  —  which  throws  him  as  it  were  into 
relief  from  the  general  household  of  faith,  —  but 
through  that  which  unites  him  to  them  all.  And 
when  I  think  of  this,  I  feel  that  our  present  need  is 
not  so  much  of  the  signs  of  an  Apostle,  wrought 

K 


162  NOTES. 

among  us  in  signs  and  wonders,  in  mighty  and  merci 
ful  deeds,  as  of  a  more  general  partaking  in  those 
covenanted  blessings,  given  under  the  usual  economy 
of  grace,  to  every  man  to  profit  withal.  We  may  be 
able  to  number  few  men  of  mark  and  feature,  we 
have  among  us  but  "  few  names."  Yet  need  we  go 
round  our  Zion,  counting  up  her  towers  and  telling 
over  her  spiritual  bulwarks  ?  It  is  enough  for  us, 
looking  to  her  sure  foundation,  to  be  able  to  say  that 
"This  man  was  born  in  her" ;  sufficient  to  know  that 
the  Highest  doth  even  now  inhabit  her.  The  times 
and  the  seasons  are  in  God's  hands ;  for  aught  we 
know,  it  may  not  fall  within  his  plan  that  individual 
gifts  should  be  as  conspicuous  as  in  earlier  ages ;  dif 
fusion  of  light  may  in  some  degree  interfere  with  its 
concentration,  and  will  at  any  rate  cause  it  to  appear 
less  splendid.  There  are  peculiar  manifestations,  even 
as  the  Apostle  tells  us,  but  one  Lord ;  diversities  of 
gifts,  worthy  of  being  coveted  earnestly,  yet  one  in 
clusive  of  them  all,  the  living  membership  in  Christ, 
in  which  his  people,  whatever  they  may  keep  or  lose, 
have  still  all  things  in  common. 


NOTE  G.  —  Page  86. 

ST.  PAUL  speaks  of  being  able  to  comfort  such 
of  his  converts  as  were  in  trouble,  with  the  com 
fort  wherewith  he  himself  was  comforted  of  God. 


NOTES.  163 

Who  can  impart  anything  that  he  has  not  first  re 
ceived'?  And  where  are  the  souls  that  have  such 
especial  need  of  being  established  in  the  everlasting 
consolations  of  God,  as  those  "  sons  of  consolation," 
the  Levites  of  the  better  covenant,  who  are  con 
tinually  called  upon  to  administer  it  to  others?  As 
the  Apostles  spoke  of  themselves  as  "  witnesses," 
chosen  before  of  God,  to  declare  among  the  people 
the  things  which  they  had  heard  and  seen,  so  should 
their  successors,  called  with  a  like  holy  calling  unto 
a  like  holy  office  and  ministry,  be  able  to  speak  of 
the  things  concerning  the  kingdom  of  God,  as  of  that 
which  they  do  know,  and  to  testify  of  them  as  of  that 
which  they  have  seen.  The  spiritual  husbandman, 
laboring  in  his  Lord's  vineyard,  must  be  first  a  par 
taker  of  its  fruits  (2  Tim.  ii.  6),  and  should  be  able 
to  speak  of  the  good  country  where  they  grow  as  of  a 
land  with  which  he  is  familiar.  The  Gospel  of  salva 
tion  should  not  fall  from  his  lips  like  an  historic  nar 
rative,  —  it  is  not  a  book  which  he  is  reading,  but  a 
story  which  he  is  relating  out  of  the  intimacy  of  per 
sonal  experience.  "  We  are  his  witnesses  in  these 
things."  "  O  come  hither,"  says  the  Psalmist,  "  and 
I  will  tell  you  what  God  hath  done  for  my  soul."  — 
See  on  this  subject  two  tracts  published  at  Leeds, 
1854  :  "  Authorities  for  the  Certainty  of  Grace,"  by 
the  Rev.  R.  Collins ;  and  "  Renewal  or  Conversion," 
by  the  Rev.  R.  Aitkin. 


164  NOTES. 


NOTE  H.  — Page  102. 

"  A  |  MIE  Spirit  of  God  yet  causes  men  to  hope 
_1_  that  a  world  will  come ;  the  better  one, 
they  call  it,  perhaps  they  might  more  wisely  call 
it  the  real  one.  Also  I  hear  them  speak  continually 
of  going  to  it,  rather  than  of  its  coming  to  them, 
which  again  is  strange;  for  in  that  prayer  which 
they  had  straight  from  the  lips  of  the  Life  of  the 
world,  there  is  not  anything  about  going  to  another 
world,  —  only  something  of  another  world  coming 
into  this,  or  rather  not  another,  but  the  only  govern 
ment,  that  government  which  will  constitute  a  World 
indeed,  new  heavens  and  a  new  earth.  Earth  no 
more  without  form  and  void,  but  sown  with  fruits  of 
righteousness  ;  Firmament  no  more  of  passing  cloud, 
but  of  cloud  risen  out  of  the  crystal  sea ;  cloud  in 
which,  as  He  was  once  received  up,  so  He  shall  again 
come  with  power."  —  RUSKIN. 


NOTE  L  — Page  128. 

ST.  PAUL  saith,  "  The  spirit  will  give  itself  up 
to  God,  and  trust  in  Him  and  obey,  but  reason, 
flesh  and  blood,  will  resist,  and  cannot  upward  rise." 
Therefore  must  our  Lord  God  bear  with  us.  One 
person  asked,  "  Wherefore  doth  not  God  impart  full 
knowledge?"  Dr.  Martin  replied,  "If  any  one 


NOTES.  165 

could  indeed  believe,  then  for  very  joy  he  would  be 
able  neither  to  eat  nor  drink,  nor  do  aught  else."  — 
LIFE  OF  LUTHER. 


NOTE  K.  —  Pase  134. 


WE  must  not  insist  upon  any  routine  in  re 
ligious  experience,  as  the  spiritual  disci 
pline  to  which  believers  are  subjected  varies  with  the 
probation  of  outward  life.  To  the  sinful  and  ignorant 
the  awakening  to  God  is  as  the  coming  in  of  light, 
making  them  to  see  their  ways  and  to  loathe  them 
selves  for  their  doings  which  were  not  good ;  to 
others,  already  in  the  way,  it  is  the  discovery  of 
love,  Thou  meetest  him  that  worketh  righteousness, 
those  that  remember  thee  in  thy  ways. 

The  work  of  the  Holy  Spirit  includes  both  teach 
ing  and  training;  it  has  not  only  to  enlighten  the 
intellect  to  apprehend  Divine  truth,  but  also  to  guide 
the  heart  into  its  ways.  Some  believers  seem  from 
the  first  taught  of  God  to  look  to  the  work  of  Christ ; 
a  deep  conviction  of  sinfulness,  a  sense  of  impending 
danger,  draw  them  to  Him  as  to  a  Saviour.  Having 
been  filled  with  their  own  ways,  and  having  tasted  of 
the  bitterness  they  led  to,  they  experience  deep  sor 
row,  and  with  it  that  peculiar  joy  of  the  pardoned 
soul,  unlike,  as  you  say,  to  any  other,  in  its  union  of 
deep  sorrow  with  grateful  love  and  joy.  To  such 
spirits  the  work  of  their  Lord  is  precious,  they 


166  NOTES. 

feel  their  need  of  it  at  every  step,  yet  they  have 
still  a  training,  sometimes  a  very  severe  one,  to  go 
through,  —  a  will  to  be  subdued,  affections  to  be 
purified.  To  others,  the  discipline  comes  first,  they 
are  drawn  to  our  Lord  through  a  yearning  after 
moral  perfection,  which  leads  them  to  seek  the  ex 
cellency  which  shines  nowhere  so  brightly  as  in  Him. 
They  seek  Him  in  ordinances,  through  duties.  He  is 
for  them,  perhaps  for  a  long  time,  a  Prince  rather 
than  a  Saviour,  yet  all  the  while  the  Will  of  God  is 
instructing  them  in  the  doctrine.  Though  at  this 
stage  they  are  little  able  to  be  the  guides  and  com 
forters  of  others,  their  own  feet  stand  firm,  and  when 
a  clearer  light  dawns,  it  finds  them  upon  the  path  on 
which,  like  early  travellers,  they  have  set  forth  be 
fore  the  breaking  of  the  day,  —  the  path  on  which  no 
true  wayfarer,  though  he  might  walk  on  it  long  in 
darkness,  ever  yet  erred.  We  may  compare  the 
hearts*  of  these  just  persons  to  a  fair,  well-ordered 
room,  with  the  fire  on  the  hearth  laid  ready  for  kin 
dling.  We  are  conscious  of  a  dullness  in  the  at 
mosphere,  for  the  Master  has  not  yet  come,  but  all  is 
prepared  for  Him,  and  for  the  touch  of  the  living 
coal  that  will  light  up  all  into  a  steadfast  glow. 


NOTES.  167 


NOTE  L.  — Page  138. 

A  REAL  though  not  as  yet  a  complete  change ; 
one  which  may  be  illustrated  through  that 
which  in  the  Persian  fable  passes  over  the  clay 
which  the  rose  has  permeated.  It  has  gained  a  real 
sweetness,  though  independent  of  its  fragrant  com 
panion  it  would  be,  what  in  a  certain  sense  it  even 
now  remains,  "  a  miserable  piece  of  clay." 

"  Christ,"  says  Baxter,  "  is  not  such  a  physician 
as  to  perform  but  a  supposed  or  reputative  cure. 
He  came  not  to  persuade  His  Father  to  judge  us  to  be 
well  because  He  himself  is  well,  or  to  leave  us  uncured, 
persuading  God  that  we  are  cured.  Never  did  the 
blessed  Son  of  God  intend  in  His  dying  or  merits  to 
change  the  Holy  Nature  of  His  Father,  and  to  cause 
Him  to  love  that  which  is  unlovely,  or  to  reconcile 
Him  to  that  which,  as  He  is  God,  He  abhorreth.  "We 
must  bear  His  image,  and  be  holy  as  He  is  holy,  be 
fore  He  can  approve  us  or  love  us  with  complacency. 
This  is  the  work  of  our  Blessed  Redeemer,  to  make 
man  fit  for  God's  approbation  and  delight.  He  re- 
generateth  us  that  He  may  sanctify  us  and  fit  us  for 
our  Master's  use." 

Children  talk  of  repeating  things  by  heart.  Is 
there  not  such  a  thing  as  living  by  heart  ?  "  Ye  shall 
know  the  truth,"  saith  Christ,  "  and  the  truth  shall 
make  you  free."  Obedience,  long  persevered  in,  will 
grow  less  and  less  conscious,  and  Christ  will  become, 


168  NOTES. 

in  a  simple  and  literal  sense,  the  life  of  them  that  be 
lieve.  This  state  is  so  far  assimilated  to  that  of 
Heaven,  that  its  guiding  principle  is  in  a  less  degree 
faith  than  love,  a  confidence  less  founded  upon  that 
which  is  still  unseen,  than  built  up  upon  that  which  is 
known  and  loved.  A  state,  in  which  the  soul's  con 
verse  is  not  framed  like  a  speech  acquired  by  rules 
and  study,  but  is  idiomatic,  the  natural  expression  of 
natural  feelings.  Yet  even  this  has  been  acquired. 
As  in  the  fine  arts,  we  must  work  by  rule  until  we 
are  able  to  work  without  it.  May  not  a  habit  of  the 
soul  be  formed,  as  well  as  a  habit  of  the  eye  or  hand, 
when  the  outward  rule  has  passed  into  an  inward 
law,  working  out  in  that  soul  an  obedience  "  so  uni 
versal,  so  subtle,  and  so  glorious,  that  nothing  but  the 
heart  can  keep  it."  *  The  true  artist  is  not  thinking 
(consciously)  of  his  rules,  yet  keeps  them  all.  Is 
there  not  a  state  corresponding  to  this  in  spiritual 
life,  one  in  which  wisdom  reveals  herself  to  such  of 
her  true  lovers  as  have  sought  her  from  "  the  flower 
to  the  grape  ?  "  —  when  her  glorious  classics,  first 
learnt,  as  at  school,  as  a  hard  and  distasteful  lesson, 
studied  faithfully,  but  as  a  task  —  often,  perhaps, 
wept  over  —  are  taken  up,  not  by  constraint,  but 
willingly,  their  difficulties  explained,  their  beauties 
appreciated,  as  a  bosom-book,  "guide,  companion, 
and  familiar  friend." 

*  Ruskin. 


NOTES.  169 


NOTE  M.  — Page  151. 

£^  PIRITUAL  freedom  is  not  founded  upon  law- 
O  lessness,  but  upon  obedience,  as  St.  Bernard 
says,  to  a  better  will  than  our  own ;  it  is  not  freedom 
from  law,  but  freedom  from  that  within  ourselves 
which  makes  it  felt  as  a  constraint,  —  the  rejoicing 
freedom  which  loves  the  authority  it  lives  under. 
There  seems  much  profit  in  considering  the  nature 
of  true  spiritual  recreation,  little  in  endeavoring  to 
trace  out  its  attainable  degree.  Some  pious  thinkers 
have  fixed  this  at  a  limit  which,  although  it  may  not 
want  the  support  of  an  isolated  passage  of  Scripture, 
is  opposed  to  its  general  tenor,  and  also  contradictory 
to  a  deep-seated  instinct  which  assures  us  that  per 
fection,  if  here  attainable,  would  involve  a  latent 
imperfection  from  which  the  soul  shrinks.  Under 
our  present  conditions  of  being,  we  feel  that  we  need 
that  sense  of  dependence  upon  God  which  a  con 
sciousness  of  frailty  inspires ;  where  without  this 
would  be  the  adoring  humility,  the  tender,  implicit 
reliance  upon  a  better  righteousness  than  our  own  ? 
The  perfection  of  which  our  nature  is  capable  is  not 
that  of  a  state  complete  in  itself,  wrought  out  and 
established  within  the  soul  at  once  and  forever. 
The  very  life  of  the  renewed  soul  is  relative ;  its 
beauty  and  strength  derived. 

"  Thou  sowest  not  yet  that  thing  which  shall  be,  but 
bare  grain,"  a  seed  with  which  the  Divine  Ilusband- 


170  NOTES. 

man  has  long  patience,  but  whose  growth  both  to  the 
anxious  and  the  scornful  eye  seems  tardy,  thin,  and 
too  often  blighted  with  the  east  wind.  Christ  is  con 
tent  to  be  for  a  while  in  the  world  and  in  the  heart 
the  smallest  of  seeds,  content  to  be  a  grain  of  corn, 
which,  falling  into  the  dry  and  long-drawn  furrow, 
upon  the  beaten  path,  the  wind-swept  common,  lives, 
but  often  as  "dying."  He  who  was  Himself  rejected 
seems  to  be  satisfied  with  that  which  man  despises. 
Man  asks  for  that  which  is  absolute  ;  limited  results, 
partial  triumphs,  do  not  satisfy  him.  Hence  we  find 
the  unbeliever  demanding  what  the  Christian  desires, 
and  refusing  to  believe  in  any  change,  unless  that 
change  be  thorough,  and  so  to  speak  magical. 

"  Our  position  is  briefly  this,"  says  a  writer  in  the 
Westminster  Review  (January,  1852).  "  We  believe 
in  intellectual  conversion,  and,  to  a  certain  extent,  in 
gradual  modification  of  the  moral  nature  ;  but  it  is  in 
defiance  of  all  sound  psychology  to  believe  in  a  sud 
den  moral  conversion  following  upon  an  intellectual 
conversion.  Once  let  a  man  arrive  at  maturity  with 
any  distinctive  character,  and  it  is  idle  to  think  that 
he  will  change  it.  Physiology  will  teach  us  that  it 
is  impossible.  Sorrow  turning  his  thoughts  inwards; 
or  calamity  shattering  his  pride  and  confidence,  may 
effect  great  changes  in  the  outward  manifestations, 
but  they  will  not  alter  the  inward  nature.  They 
may  make  the  irreligious  soul  fanatical,  they  will 
not  make  it  religious;  they  may  make  pride  ape 
humility,  they  will  not  make  the  spirit  humble. 


NOTES.  171 

There  may  be  repentance,  there  may  be  sorrowing, 
remorse,  but  there  cannot  be  change.  (?)  We  may 
make  vows  in  anguish  over  remembered  sins,  and 
keep  our  vows  as  far  as  regard  overt  acts,  but  the 
nature  which  originally  moved  us  along  the  path  of 
crime  remains  unchangeable,  unchanged.  The  no 
torious  sinner  metamorphosed  into  a  saint  is  only  a 
change  of  attitude,  not  a  change  of  being.  A  man 
may  change  his  convictions,  his  views,  his  deepest 
and  most  settled  opinions,  but  he  cannot  change  his 
temperament,  his  passions,  his  moral  nature.  Intel 
lectual  conversion  is  not  co-extensive  with  and  coer 
cive  of  moral  conversion,  the  organic  qualities  of  the 
mind  (of  which  certain  tempers  are  the  outward 
manifestations)  cannot  be  constituted  anew." 

Yet  a  man  who  has  experienced  sorrow  and  re 
pentance,  whose  views,  convictions,  deepest  and  most 
settled  opinions,  are  altered,  is  surely  a  changed  man, 
however  far  from  being  a  perfect  one.  Opinions  like 
the  foregoing  seem  founded  upon  ignorance  of  the 
field  in  which  Divine  grace  works,  the  will  of  man  ; 
conversion  is  not  a  change  of  nature,  but  a  change  of 
will,  of  aim,  and  affection.  Christians,  as  well  as  un 
believers,  need  Neander's  warning  to  beware  "  of 
that  lifeless  supernaturalism  which  views  all  Divine 
communications  rather  as  overlying  the  mind  than  as 
incorporating  themselves  with  its  natural  psycho 
logical  development,"  —  we  must  consider  them,  ac 
cording  to  our  Lord's  figure,  as  seed  growing  with 
the  mind,  and  also  suffering  with  it  from  checks  and 
blights. 


172  NOTES. 

"In  Jesus  Christ,"  he  says,  "the  actual  and  the 
ideal  meet  truly."     He  is  all  that  He  means,  all  that 
He  claims  to  be  ;  but  it  is  far  otherwise  with  His  fol 
lowers,  in  whom  the  fact  falls  short,  the  outline 
is   ever   incompletely   filled.      Christianity 
in  the  world  conforms  to  the  conditions 
that  limit  Humanity,  humbling 
itself,  even  as   Christ  did, 
in    being   found   in 
fashion    as    a 


man. 


Cambridge :    Stereotyped  and  Printed  by  Welch,  Bigelow,  &  Co. 


ny  Books  in  this  list  will  be  sent  free  of  postage,  on  receipt 
of  price. 

BOSTON,  135  WASHINGTON  STREET, 
DECEMBER,  1862. 

A   LIST   OF   BOOKS 

PUBLISHED    BY 

TICKNOR    AND    FIELDS. 


Sir  Walter  Scott. 

ILLUSTRATED   HOUSEHOLD   EDITION   OF   THE  WAVER- 

LEY  NOVELS.    50  volumes.    In  portable  size,  16mo.  form.    Now 
Complete.    Price  90  cents  a  volume. 

The  paper  is  of  fine  quality;  the  stereotype  plates  are  not  old 
ones  repaired,  the  type  having  been  cast  expressly  for  this  edi 
tion.  The  Novels  are  illustrated  with  capital  steel  plates  en 
graved  in  the  best  manner,  after  drawings  and  paintings  by  the 
most  eminent  artists,  among  whom  are  Birket  Foster,  Darley, 
Billings,  Landseer,  Harvey,  and  Faed.  This  Edition  contains 
all  the  latest  notes  and  corrections  of  the  author,  a  Glossary  and 
Index;  and  some  curious  additions,  especially  in  "  Guy  Mtin- 
nering"  and  the  "Bride  of  Lammermoor ; "  being  the  fullest 
edition  of  the  Novels  ever  published.  Tlie  notes  are  at  the  foot 
of  the  page, — a  great  convenience  to  the  reader. 

Any  of  the  following  Novels  sold  separate. 
WAVERLET,  2  vols.  ST.  RONAN'S  WELL,  2  vols. 

GUY  MANNERINO,  2  vols.  REDGAUNTLET,  2  vols. 

THE  ANTIQUARY,  2  vols.  THE  BETROTHED,  )9      , 

ROB  ROY,  2  vols.  THE  HIGHLAND  WIDOW,    J  • 

OLD  MORTALITY,  2  vols.  THE  TALISMAN,  1 

BLACK  DWARF,  )  «  _o]s  Two  DROVERS, 

LEGEND  OF  MONTROSE,   f  MY  AUNT  MARGARET'S  MIRROR,  >2  vols. 

HEART  OP  MID  LOTHIAN,  2  vols.  THE  TAPESTRIED  CHAMBER, 
BRIDE  OF  LAMMERMOOR,  2  vols.    THE  LAIRD'S  JOCK, 
IVANHOE,  2  vols.  WOODSTOCK,  2  vols. 

THE  MONASTERY,  2  vols.  THE  FAIR  MAID  OF  PERTH,  2  vols. 

THE  ABBOT,  2  vols.  ANNE  OF  GEIERSTEIN,  2  vols. 

KENILWORTH,  2  vols.  COUNT  ROBERT  OF  PARIS,  2  vols. 

THE  PIRATE,  2 vols.  THE  SURGEON'S  DAUGHTER,) 

THE  FORTUNES  OF  NIGEL,  2  vols.  CASTLE  DANGEROUS,  [  2  vols. 

PEVERIL  OF  THE  PEAK,  2  vols.     INDEX  AND  GLOSSARY,        ) 

QUENTIN  DURWARD,   2  VOlS. 

TALES  OP  A  GRANDFATHER.    Illustrated.    6  vols     $5.40. 
LIFE.     By  J.  G.  Lockhart.     Illustrated  Edition.     Uniform 

with  Novels.     9  vols.     Cloth.    $8.10. 


2         A  LiSt  of  Books  Publifhed 
Thomas  De  Quincey. 

CONFESSIONS  OF  AN  ENGLISH  OPIUM-EATER,  AND  Sus- 
PIRIA  DE  PROFUNDIS.  With  Portrait.  90  cents. 

BIOGRAPHICAL  ESSAYS.     90  cents. 

MISCELLANEOUS  ESSAYS.     90  cents. 

THE  CAESARS.     90  cents. 

LITERARY  REMINISCENCES.     2  vols.    $1.80. 

NARRATIVE  AND  MISCELLANEOUS  PAPERS.   2  vols.  $1.80. 

ESSAYS  ON  THE  POETS,  &c.     1  vol.     90  cents. 

HISTORICAL  AND  CRITICAL  ESSAYS.     2  vols.    $1.80. 

AUTOBIOGRAPHIC  SKETCHES.     1  vol.     90  cents. 

ESSAYS  ON  PHILOSOPHICAL  WRITERS,  &c.   2  vols.  $1.80. 

LETTERS  TO  A  YOUNG  MAN,  AND  OTHER  PAPERS.  1  vol. 
90  cents. 

THEOLOGICAL   ESSAYS  AND    OTHER   PAPERS.      2  vols. 

$1.80. 

THE  NOTE  BOOK.     1  vol.     90  cents. 

MEMORIALS  AND  OTHER  PAPERS.     2  vols.    $1.80. 

THE  AVENGER  AND  OTHER  PAPERS.     1  vol.     90  cents. 

LOGIC  OF  POLITICAL  ECONOMY,  AND  OTHER  PAPERS. 
1  vol.  90  cents. 

BEAUTIES,  selected  from  the  writings  of  Thomas  De  Quin 
cey.  With  an  Introductory  Notice  and  fine  Portrait  of  the 
author.  1  vol.  $1.50. 

Alfred  Tennyson. 

POETICAL  WORKS.  With  Portrait.  2  vols.  Cloth.  $2.25. 
POCKET  EDITION  OF  POEMS  COMPLETE.  2  vols.  $2.00. 
POEMS.  Complete  in  one  volume.  With  Portrait.  $1.13. 
POEMS.  Cabinet  Edition.  Vellum  cloth,  elegant.  2  vols. 
$2.50. 

THE  PRINCESS.  Cloth.  60  cents. 
IN  MEMORIAM.  Cloth.  90  cents. 
The  Same.  Holiday  Edition.  With  Portraits  of  Tennyson 

and  Arthur  Hallam,  and  Biographical  Sketch.    $3.00. 
MAUD,  AND  OTHER  POEMS.     Cloth.     60  cents. 
IDYLLS  OF  THE  KING.     Cloth.    90  cents. 


by    TlCKNOR    AND    FlELDS.  3 

Thomas    Hood. 

MEMORIALS.     Edited  by  his  Children.     2  vols.     $2.00. 

Charles    Dickens. 

[ENGLISH  EDITION.] 
THE   COMPLETE  WORKS  OF  CHARLES   DICKENS.    Fine 

Library  Edition.  Published  simultaneously  in  London  and 
Boston.  English  print,  fine  cloth  binding,  22  vols.  12mo. 
$27.50. 

Henry  W.  Longfellow. 

POETICAL  WORKS.    2  vols.     Boards,  $2.00.     Cloth,  $2.50. 
POETICAL  WORKS.     Cabinet  Edition.     Vellum  cloth,  ele 
gant    2  vols.    $2.50. 
POCKET  EDITION  OF  POETICAL  WORKS.    In  two  volumes. 

Bine  and  gold.     $2.00. 

POCKET  EDITION  OF  PROSE  WORKS  COMPLETE.    In  two 

volumes.     Blue  and  gold,    $2.00. 
THE  SONG  OF  HIAWATHA.    $1.25. 
EVANGELINE  :  A  Tale  of  Acadia.     90  cents. 
THE  GOLDEN  LEGEND.     A  Poem.     $1.25. 
HYPERION.     A  Romance.     $1.25. 
OUTRE-MER.     A  Pilgrimage.     $1.25. 
KAVANAGII.     A  Tale.     90  cents. 
THE    COURTSHIP   OF   MILES  STANDISH.     1  vol.     16mo. 

90  cents. 
Illustrated  editions  of  EVANGELINE,  POEMS,  HYPERION, 

THE  GOLDEN  LEGEND,  and  MILES  STANDISH. 

Charles  Reade. 

PEG  WOFFINGTON.     A  Novel.     90  cents. 

CHRISTIE  JOHNSTONE.     A  Novel.     90  cents. 

CLOUDS  AND  SUNSHINE.     A  Novel.     90  cents. 

"NEVER  TOO  LATE  TO  MEND."     2  vols.    $1.75. 

WHITE  LIES.     A  Novel.     1  vol.    $1.50. 

PROPRIA  QUJE  MARIIJUS  and  THE  Box  TUNNEL.    25  cts. 

THE  EIGHTH  COMMANDMENT.     75  cents. 


4          A  Lift  of  Books  Publifhed 
James  Russell  Lowell. 

COMPLETE  POETICAL  WORKS.   In  Blue  and  Gold.   2  vols. 

$2.00. 

POETICAL   WORKS.     2  vols.   16mo.     Cloth.     $2.00. 
SIR  LAUNFAL.    New  Edition.     25  cents. 
A  FABLE  FOR  CRITICS.    New  Edition.    60  cents. 
THE  BIGLOW  PAPERS.    New  Edition.     75  cents. 
CONVERSATIONS  ON  THE  OLD  POETS.    3d  edition.     75  cts. 
FIRESIDE  TRAVELS.    In  Press. 

Nathaniel  Hawthorne. 

TWICE-TOLD  TALES.     Two  volumes.    $2.00. 
THE  SCARLET  LETTER.     $1.00. 
THE  HOUSE  OF  THE  SEVEN  GABLES.    $1.25. 
THE   SNOW  IMAGE,  AND  OTHER  TALES.    $1.00. 
THE  BLITHEDALE  ROMANCE.    $1.00. 

MOSSES    FROM    AN    OLD   MANSE.       2    Vols.      $2.00. 

THE  MARBLE  FAUN.     2  vols.    $2.00. 
TRUE  STORIES.     90  cents. 

A   WONDER-BOOK   FOR    GlRLS   AND    BOYS.      90  Cents. 

TANGLEWOOD  TALES.     90  cents. 

Edwin  P.  Whipple. 

ESSAYS  AND  REVIEWS.     2  vols.    $2.50. 
LECTURES  ON  LITERATURE  AND  LIFE.     75  cents. 
WASHINGTON  AND  THE  REVOLUTION.    20  cents. 

Charles  Kingsley. 

Two  YEARS  AGO.    A  New  Novel.    $1.50. 

AMYAS  LEIGH.    A  Novel.    $1.50. 

GLAUCUS  ;  OR,  THE  WONDERS  OF  THE  SHORE.    50  cts. 

POETICAL  WORKS.    75  cents. 

THE  HEROES  ;  OR,  GREEK  FAIRY  TALES.    90  cents. 

ANDROMEDA  AND  OTHER  POEMS.    50  cents. 

SIR  WALTER  RALEIGH  AND  HIS  TIME,  &c.    $1.25. 

NEW  MISCELLANIES.    1  vol.    $1.00. 


by   TlCKNOR    AND    FlELDS.  5 

Jane    Austen. 

PRIDE    AND    PREJUDICE,    AND    NORTHANGER    ABBEY. 

1  vol.     $1.25.     Nearly  ready. 

MANSFIELD  PARK.     1  vol.     $1.25.     Nearly  read}/. 
SENSE  AND  SENSIBILITY,  AND  PERSUASION.  1  vol.  $1.25. 

Nearly  ready. 
EMMA.     1  vol.     $1.25.     Nearly  ready. 

George  S.   Hillard. 

Six  MONTHS  IN  ITALY.     1  vol.     16rao.    $1.75. 

DANGERS  AND  DUTIES  OF  THE  MERCANTILE  PROFES 
SION.  25  cents. 

SELECTIONS  FROM  THE  WRITINGS  OF  WALTER  SAVAGE 
LANDOR.  1  vol.  16mo.  75  cents. 

Oliver  Wendell  Holmes. 

ELSIE  VENNER  :  a  Romance  of  Destiny.  2  vols.  Cloth.  $2.00. 
POEMS.    With  fine  Portrait.     Cloth.     $1.25. 
POEMS.     Blue  and  Gold.    With  new  Portrait.    1  vol.    Cloth. 
$1.00. 

SONGS  IN  MANY  KEYS.    A  new  volume.    $1.25. 
ASTR^A.     Fancy  paper.     25  cents. 

THE  AUTOCRAT  OF  THE  BREAKFAST  TABLE.  With  Il 
lustrations  by  Hoppin.  16mo.  $1.25. 

The  Same.   Large  Paper  Edition.  8vo.  Tinted  paper.  $3.00. 
THE   PROFESSOR   AT    THE   BREAKFAST  TABLE.     16mo. 

$1.25. 

The  Same.  Large  Paper  Edition.  8vo.  Tinted  paper.  $3.00, 
CURRENTS  AND  COUNTER-CURRENTS,  AND  OTHER  MEDI 
CAL  ESSAYS.    1  vol.     Cloth.    $1.25. 

BORDER  LINES  IN  SOME  PROVINCES  OF  MEDICAL  SCI 
ENCE.  1  vol.  Cloth.  50  cents. 

Ralph  Waldo  Emerson. 

ESSAYS.     1st  Series.     1  vol.     $1.25. 
ESSAYS.     2d  Series.     1  vol.     $1.25. 
MISCELLANIES.     1  vol.     $1.25. 
REPRESENTATIVE  MEN.     1  vol.    $1.25. 
ENGLISH  TRAITS.     1  vol.    $1.25. 
POEMS.     1  vol.     $1.25. 
CONDUCT  OF  LIFE.     1  vol.     $1.25. 


6         A  Lift  of  Books  Publifhed 
Goethe. 

WILHELM  MEISTER.   Translated  by  Carlyle.   2  vols.   $2.50. 
FAUST.     Translated  by  Hayward.     90  cents. 
FAUST.     Translated  by  Charles  T.  Brooks.    $1.00. 
CORRESPONDENCE  WITH  A  CHILD.    Bettina.    1  vol.    12mo. 

$1.50. 

Henry  Giles. 

LECTURES,  ESSAYS,  &c.     2  vols.    $1.50. 
DISCOURSES  ON  LIFE.     75  cents. 
ILLUSTRATIONS  OF  GENIUS.     Cloth.    $1.00. 

John  G.  Whittier. 

POCKET  EDITION  OF  POETICAL  WORKS.    2  vols.    $2.00. 

OLD  PORTRAITS  AND  MODERN  SKETCHES.     75  cents. 

MARGARET  SMITH'S  JOURNAL.     75  cents. 

SONGS  OF  LABOR,  AND  OTHER  POEMS.    Boards.    50  cts. 

THE  CHAPEL  OF  THE  HERMITS.     Cloth.     50  cents. 

LITERARY  RECREATIONS,  &c.     Cloth.     $1.00. 

THE  PANORAMA,  AND  OTHER  POEMS.     Cloth.    50  cents. 

HOME  BALLADS  AND  POEMS.     A  new  volume.     75  cents. 

Capt.  Mayne  Reid. 

THE  PLANT  HUNTERS.     With  Plates.     90  cents. 

THE  DESERT  HOME:  OR,  THE  ADVENTURES  OF  A  LOST 

FAMILY  IN  THE  WILDERNESS.     With  fine  Plates.    $1.00. 
THE  BOY  HUNTERS.     With  fine  Plates.     90  cents. 
THE  YOUNG  VOYAGEURS  :   OR,  THE  BOY  HUNTERS  IN 

THE  NORTH.    With  Plates.    90  cents. 
THE  FOREST  EXILES.     With  fine  Plates.     90  cents. 
THE  BUSH  BOYS.     With  fine  Plates.     90  cents. 
THE  YOUNG  YAGERS.     With  fine  Plates.     90  cents. 
RAN  AWAY  TO  SEA  :   AN  AUTOBIOGRAPHY  FOR  BOYS. 

With  fine  Plates.     90  cents. 
THE   BOY   TAR  :    A  VOYAGE  IN  THE   DARK.     A  New 

Book.     With  fine  Plates.     90  cents. 
ODD  PEOPLE.     With  Plates.     90  cents. 
The  Same.     Cheap  Edition.     With  Plates.     50  cents. 
BRUIN  :  OR,  THE  GRAND  BEAR  HUNT.  With  Plates.  90  cts. 


by   TlCKNOR    AND    FlELDS.  7 

Rev.  F.  W.  Robertson. 

SERMONS.  First  Series,    $1.13. 

«  Second    "         $1.13. 

"  Third       "         $1.13. 

"  Fourth    "         $1.13. 

LECTURES  AND  ADDRESSES  ON  LITERARY  AND  SOCIAL 

TOPICS.     $1.13. 

Mrs.  Jameson. 

CHARACTERISTICS  OF  WOMEN.  Blue  and  Gold.  $1.00. 

LOVES  OF  THE  POETS.  "  "  $1.00. 

DIARY  OF  AN  ENNUYEE.  "  "  $1.00. 

SKETCHES  OF  ART,  &c.  "  "  $1.00. 

STUDIES  AND  STORIES.  "  "  $1.00. 

ITALIAN  PAINTERS.  "  "  $1.00. 

LEGENDS  OF  THE  MADONNA.  "  "  $1.00. 

SISTERS  OF  CHARITY.     1  vol.  16mo.  75  cents. 

Grace  Greenwood. 

GREENWOOD  LEAVES.    1st  and  2d  Series.     $1.25  each. 

POETICAL  WORKS.    With  fine  Portrait.     75  cents. 

HISTORY  OF  MY  PETS.  With  six  fine  Engravings.  Scarlet 
cloth.  60  cents. 

RECOLLECTIONS  OF  MY  CHILDHOOD.  With  six  fine  En 
gravings.  Scarlet  cloth.  60  cents. 

HAPS  AND  MISHAPS  OF  A  TOUR  IN  EUROPE.    $1.25. 

MERRIE  ENGLAND.     90  cents. 

A  FOREST  TRAGEDY,  AND  OTHER  TALES.    $1.00. 

STORIES  AND  LEGENDS.     90  cents. 

STORIES  FROM  FAMOUS  BALLADS.    Illustrated.    60  cents. 

BONNIE  SCOTLAND.    Illustrated.     90  cents. 

Henry  D.  Thoreau. 

WALDEN.     1  vol.     16mo.     $1.25. 

A  WEEK  ON  THE  CONCORD  AND  MEKRIMACK  RIVERS. 
1  vol.  12mo.  $1.60. 


8         A  Lift  of  Books  Publifhed 
Mrs.   Harriet  Beecher  Stowe. 

THE  PEARL  OF  ORR'S  ISLAND.     1  vol.    $1.50. 
AGNES  OF  SORRENTO.     1  vol.    $1.50. 
UNCLE  TOM'S  CABIN.     1  vol.    $1.50. 

Samuel  Smiles. 

LIFE  OF  GEORGE  STEPHENSON,  ENGINEER.    $1.13. 
SELF  HELP  ;  WITH  ILLUSTRATIONS  OF  CHARACTER  AND 

CONDUCT.     With  Portrait.     1  vol.     75  cents. 
BRIEF  BIOGRAPHIES.     With  Plates.     $1.25. 

Theodore  Winthrop. 

CECIL  DREEME.     1  vol.     Cloth.     $1.00. 

JOHN  BRENT.     1  vol.     Cloth.     $1.00. 

EDWIN  BROTHERTOFT.     1  vol.     Cloth.     $1.00. 

THE  CANOE  AND  THE  SADDLE.     1  vol.     Cloth.    $1.00. 

Miss  Cummins. 

EL  FUREIDIS.     By  the  Author  of  "  The  Lamplighter,"  &c. 

$1.00. 

Thomas   Hughes. 

SCHOOL  DAYS  AT  RUGBY.  By  An  Old  Boy.  1  vol.  16mo. 
$1.13. 

The  Same.     Illustrated  edition.     $1.50. 

THE  SCOURING  OF  THE  WHITE  HORSE,  OR  THE  LONG 
VACATION  HOLIDAY  OF  A  LONDON  CLERK.  By  The  Author 
of  "  School  Days  at  Rugby.'1''  1  vol.  16rao.  $1.00. 

TOM  BROWN  AT  OXFORD.  A  Sequel  to  School  Days  at 
Rugby.  2  vols.  16mo.  With  fine  Steel  Portrait  of  the  Author. 
$2.25. 

Bayard   Taylor. 

POEMS  OF  HOME  AND  TRAVEL.     Cloth.     90  cents. 

POEMS  OF  THE  ORIENT.     Cloth.     90  cents. 

A  POET'S  JOURNAL.     Cloth.     Bevelled  and  Gilt.    $1.00. 

Mary    Lowell    Putnam. 

RECORD  OF  AN  OBSCURE  MAN.    1  vol.    16mo.    75  cents. 
TRAGEDY  OF  ERRORS.     1  vol.     16mo.     75  cents. 
TRAGEDY  OF  SUCCESS.     1  vol.     16mo.     75  cemts. 


by   TlCKNOR    AND    FlELDS.  9 

R.  H.  Dana,  Jr. 

To  CUBA  AND  BACK,  a  Vacation  Voyage,  by  the  Author  of 
"  Two  Years  before  the  Mast."     90  cents. 

Miscellaneous   Works. 

[POETRY.] 

ALFORD'S  (HENRY)  POEMS.    1  vol.    16mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 
ANGEL  IN  THE  HOUSE:  THE  BETROTHAL.    1  vol.     16mo. 

Cloth.     75  cents. 
"  "          THE  ESPOUSALS.     1  vol.     16mo. 

Cloth.    75  cents. 

"  FAITHFUL  FOREVER.  1vol.  $1.00. 

ARNOLD'S  (MATTHEW)  POEMS.     1  vol.     75  cents. 
AYTOUN'S  BOTHWELL.     A  Narrative  Poem.     1   vol.     75 

cents. 
BAILEY'S  (P.  J.)   THE   MYSTIC.     1   vol.     16mo.     Cloth. 

50  cents. 
"  "         THE  AGE.     1  vol.     IGrno.     Cloth.     75 

cents. 
BARRY     CORNWALL'S     ENGLISH    SONGS    AND     OTHER 

POEMS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 

"  "  DRAMATIC  POEMS.   1  vol.  $1.00. 

BOKER'S   PLAYS  AND  POEMS.      2  vols.      16mo.      Cloth. 

$2.00, 

BROOKS'S  GERMAN  LYRICS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 

"          FAUST.     A  new  Translation.     1  vol.     $1.00. 
BROWNING'S  (ROBERT)  POEMS.     2  vols.    $2.50. 

"  "  MEN  AND  WOMEN.     1  vol.    $1.25. 

GARY'S  (PHCEBE)  POEMS  AND  PARODIES.     1  vol.     75  cts. 
CLOUGH'S    (ARTHUR  HUGH)    POEMS.      Blue  and  gold. 

$1.00. 
CROSWKLL'S  (REV.  WM.,  D.  D.)  POEMS.     Edited,  with  a 

Memoir,  by  Rev.  Arthur  Cleveland  Coxe,  D.  D.     1  vol.     $1.00. 
FRESH  HEARTS  THAT  FAILED.     By  the  Author  of  "The 

New  Priest."     1  vol.    50  cents. 
HAYNE'S  POEMS.     1  vol.     63  cents. 

"  AVOLIO     AND     OTHER     POEMS.       1     vol.      16mO. 

Cloth.     75  cents. 
HOWE'S  (MRS.  JULIA  W.)  PASSION  FLOWERS.     75  cents. 

"  "  "         WORDS  FOR  THE  HOUR.     75c. 

"  "  "          THE  WORLD'S  OWN.     50  cts. 

HUNT'S  (LEIGH)  POEMS.     2  vols.    Blue  and  Gold.    $2.00. 

"  "         RIMINI.     1  vol.     50  cents. 

HYMNS  OF  THE  AGES.     1  vol.     Enlarged  edition.     $1.50. 
HYMNS  OF  THE  AGES.     2d  Series.     1  vol.    $1.50. 
The  Same.     8vo.    Bevelled  boards.    Each  volume,  $3.00. 
JOHNSON'S  (RosA  V.)  POEMS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 


10       A  Lift  of  Books  Publifhed 


KEMBLE'S  (MRS.)  POEMS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 
LUNT'S   (GEO.)    LYRIC    POEMS.     1   vol.     16mo.     Cloth. 
63  cents. 

"  "         JULIA.     1  vol.    50  cents. 

LOCKHART'S  (J.  G.)  SPANISH  BALLADS.    With  Portrait. 

1  vol.     75  cents. 

MACKAY'S  POEMS.     1  vol.     $1.00. 
MASSEY'S   (GERALD)   POEMS.    1  vol.     Blue   and   Gold. 

$1.00. 
MEMORY- AND  HOPE.     A  Collection  of  Consolatory  Pieces. 

1  vol.     $2.00. 

MOTHERWELL'S  POEMS.     1  vol.     Blue  and  Gold.     $1.00. 
"  MINSTRELSY,  ANCIENT    AND   MODERN. 

2  vols.     $1.50. 

MULOCH'S  (Miss)  POEMS.     (By  Author  of  "John  Hali 
fax.")    1  vol.     90  cents. 

OWEN  MEREDITH'S  POEMS.    1vol.    Blue  and  Gold.  $1.00. 

PARSONS'S  POEMS.     1  vol.     $1.00. 

"         DANTE'S  INFERNO.     Translated.     In  Press. 

PERCIVAL'S  POEMS.     2  vols.    Blue  and  Gold.     $2.00. 

QUINCY'S  (J.  P.)  CHARICLES.     A  Dramatic  Poem.     1  vol. 

50  cents. 
"  "       LYTERIA  :  A  Dramatic  Poem.    "60  cents. 

READ'S  (T.  BUCHANAN)  POEMS.    New  and  complete  edi 
tion.    2  vols.     $2.25. 

REJECTED   ADDRESSES.     By   Horace   and  James    Smith. 
New  edition.     1  vol.    63  cents. 

SAXE'S  (J.  G.)  POEMS.     With  Portrait.    1  vol.    75  cents. 
"  "        THE  MONEY  KING  AND  OTHER  POEMS. 

With  new  Portrait.     1  vol.     75  cents. 

"  "         POEMS  —  the  two  foregoing  vols.  in  one. 

$1.25. 

"  «        POEMS.  Complete  in  Blue  and  Gold.  With 

Portrait.     $100. 

SMITH'S  (ALEXANDER)  LIFE  DRAMA.     1  vol.     50  cents. 
"  "  CITY  POEMS.     1  vol.     63  cents. 

«  "  EDWIN  OF   DEIRA.     With  Por 

trait.    75  cents. 
STODDARD'S  (R.  H.)  POEMS.     1  vol.    63  cents. 

"  "        SONGS  OF  SUMMER.     1  vol.    75  cts. 

SPRAGUE'S  (CHARLES)  POETICAL  AND   PROSE  WORKS. 

With  Portrait.     1  vol.     88  cents. 
TERRY'S  (ROSE)  POEMS.     1  vol.     75  cents. 
THACKERAY'S  BALLADS.     1  vol.     75  cents. 
THALATTA.     A  Book  for  the  Seaside.     1  vol.     75  cents. 
TUCKEKMAN'S  (H.  T.)  POEMS.     1  vol.     75  cents. 
WARRENIANA.     1  vol.     63  cents. 


by    TlCKNOR    AND    FlELDS.  11 


[PROSE.] 
ADAMS'  (NEHEMIAH)  A  SOUTH  SIDE  VIEW  OF  SLAVERY. 

1  vol.     75  cents. 
"  THE  SABLE  CLOUD.    1  vol.    75  cts. 

ALLSTON'S  MONALDI.     A  Tale.     1  vol.     16mo.     75  cents. 

ARAGO'S  (FRANCOIS)  BIOGRAPHIES  OF  DISTINGUISHED 
SCIENTIFIC  MKN.  2  vols.  16mo.  $2.00. 

ARNOLD'S  (DR.  THOMAS)  LIKE  AND  CORRESPONDENCE. 
Edited  by  A.  P.  Stanley.  2  vols.  12mo.  Cloth.  $2.50. 

ARNOLD'S  (W.  D.)  OAKFIELD.  A  Novel.  1  vol.  16mo. 
Cloth.  $1.00. 

ALMOST  A  HEROINE.  By  the  Author  of  "  Charles  Au- 
chester."  1  vol.  16mo.  Cloth.  $1.00. 

ARABIAN  DAYS'  ENTERTAINMENT.  Translated  from  the 
German,  by  H.  P.  Curtis.  Illustrated.  1  vol.  $1.50. 

ADDISON'S  SIR  ROGER  DE  COVERLEY.  From  the  "  Spec 
tator."  1  vol.  16mo.  Cloth.  75  cents.  Gilt,  $1.25. 

ANGEL  VOICES  ;  OR,  WORDS  OF  COUNSEL  FOR  OVER 
COMING  THE  WOULD.  1  vol.  16mo.  Tinted  paper.  50  cts. 

AMERICAN  INSTITUTE  OF  INSTRUCTION.  Lectures  deliv 
ered  before  the  Institute  in  1840-41-42-43-44-45-46-47-48-49- 
60-51-52-53-54-55-56-57-58-59-60-61.  22  vols.  12mo.  Sold  in 
separate  volumes,  each  50  cents. 

BACON'S  (DELIA)  THE  SHAKSPERIAN  PROBLEM  SOLVED. 
With  an  Introduction  by  Nathaniel  Hawthorne.  1  vol.  8vo. 
Cloth.  $3.00. 

BARTOL'S  CHURCH  AND  CONGREGATION.     1  vol.     IGmo. 

Cloth.     $1.00. 

BAILEY'S   ESSAYS   ON   OPINIONS   AND    TRUTH.     1   vol. 

16mo.     Cloth.     $1.00. 

BARRY   CORNWALL'S   ESSAYS  AND  TALES    IN    PROSE. 

2  vols.     $1.50. 

BOSTON  BOOK.  Being  Specimens  of  Metropolitan  Litera 
ture.  Cloth,  $1.25;  gilt  edge,  $1.75;  full  gilt,  $2.00. 

BUCKINGHAM'S  (J.  T.)  PERSONAL  MEMOIRS.  With  Por 
trait.  2  vols.  16mo.  Cloth.  $1.50. 

CHANNING'S  (E.  T.)  LECTURES  ON  RHETORIC  AND  ORA 
TORY.  1  vol.  16mo.  Cloth.  75  cents. 

CHANNING'S  (DR.  WALTER)  PHYSICIAN'S  VACATION. 
1  vol.  12mo.  Cloth.  $1.50. 

COALE'S  (DR.  W.  E.)  HINTS  ON  HEALTH.  1  vol.  I6mo. 
Cloth.  63  cents. 

COMBE  ON  THE  CONSTITUTION  OF  MAN.  80th  edition. 
12mo.  Cloth.  75  cents. 

CHAPEL  LITURGY.  Book  of  Common  Prayer,  according 
to  the  use  of  King's  Chapel,  Boston.  1  vol.  8vo.  Sheep,  $2.00; 
sheep,  extra,  $2.50;  sheep,  extra,  gilt  edge,  $3.00;  morocco, 
$3.50;  do.  gilt  edge,  $4.00;  do.  extra  gilt  edge,  $4.50. 

The  Same.     Cheaper  edition.     1  vol.  12mo.     Sheep,  $1.50. 


12       A  Lift  of  Books  Publifhed 


CROSLAND'S  (MRS.)  LYDIA  :  A  WOMAN'S  BOOK.     1  vol. 

75  cents. 
"  "        ENGLISH    TALES    AND    SKETCHES. 

1  vol.    $1.00. 
"  "        MEMORABLE   WOMEN.     Illustrated. 

1  vol.     $1.00. 

CUMMINS'  EL  FUREIDIS.     By  the  author  of  "  The  Lamp 
lighter."     1  vol.     16mo.    Cloth.     $1.00. 
"          LAMPLIGHTER.     1  vol.     $1.25. 
DANA'S   (R.   H.)   To   CUBA  AND  BACK.     1   vol.   16mo. 

Cloth.     90  cents. 

DUFFERIN'S  (LORD)  YACHT  VOYAGE.     1  vol.     $1.00. 
ERNEST  CARROLL  ;  OR,  ARTIST-LIFE  IN  ITALY.     1  vol. 

16mo.     Cloth.     88  cents. 
FAVORITE  AUTHORS  :  A  Companion  Book  of  Prose  and 

Poetry.     With  26  fine  Steel  Portraits.     $3.00. 
FREMONT'S    LIFE,  EXPLORATIONS,  AND    PUBLIC   SER 
VICES.    By  C.  W.  Upham.     With  Illustrations.    75  cents. 
GASKELL'S  (MRS.)  RUTH.     A  Novel.    8vo.    Paper.   38  cts. 
GUESS F.S  AT  TRUTH.  By  Two  Brothers.  1  vol.  12mo.  $1.50. 
GREENWOOD'S  (F.  W.  P.)   SERMONS  OF  CONSOLATION. 
16mo.     Cloth,  $1.00;  cloth,  gilt  edge,  $1.50; 
morocco,   plain   gilt   edge,    $2.00;    morocco, 
extra  gilt  edge,  $2.50. 

"  HISTORY  OF  THE  KING'S  CHAPEL,  BOS 

TON.    12mo.     Cloth.    50  cents. 
HEROES  OF   EUROPE.     A  capital  Boy's  Book.     With  16 

Illustrations.     1  vol.  16mo.     $1.00. 

HODSON'S  SOLDIER'S  LIFE  IN  INDIA.   1vol.    Cloth.   $1.18. 
HOWE'S  (MRS.  J.  W.)  A  TRIP  TO  CUBA.     1  vol.     16mo. 

75  cents. 
HOWITT'S  (WILLIAM)  LAND,  LABOR,  AND  GOLD.     2  vols. 

$2.00. 

"  "  A  BOY'S  ADVENTURES  IN  AUSTRA 

LIA.    90  cents. 
HOWITT'S  (ANNA  MARY)  AN  ART  STUDENT  IN  MUNICH. 

$1.25. 

»  "  A  SCHOOL  OF  LIFE.    A  Story. 

75  cents. 
HUFELAND'S  ART  OF  PROLONGING  LIFE.     1  vol.  16mo. 

Cloth.     90  cents. 
JERROLD'S  (DOUGLAS)  LIFE.     By  his  Son.     1  vol.  16mo. 

Cloth.    $1.00. 
«  "  WIT.     By  his   Son.     1  vol.  16mo. 

Cloth.    75  cents. 

JUDSON'S  (MRS.  E.  C.)  ALDERBROOK.     By  Fanny  For 
rester.    1  vol.  $1.63. 

"  "  THE    KATHAYAN   SLAVE,  AND 

OTHER  PAPERS.    1  vol.    63  cents. 

"  "  MY  TWO  SISTERS  :   A  SKETCH 

FROM  MEMORY.    50  cents. 


by    TlCKNOR    AND    FlELDS.  13 


KAVANAGH'S  (JULIA)  SEVEN  YEARS.    8vo.     30  cents. 
KINGSLEY'S  (HENRY)  GEOFFRY  HAMLYN.    1  vol.    12mo. 

Cloth.    $1.50. 

RAVENSHOE.    1  vol.   12mo.    $1.50. 
KRAPF'S    TRAVELS    AND     RESEARCHES    IN     EASTERN 

AFRICA.     1  vol.  12mo.     Cloth.     $1.25. 
LESLIE'S  (C.  R.)  AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL  RECOLLECTIONS. 

Edited  by  Tom  Taylor.     With  Portrait.      1  vol.  12mo.     Cloth. 

$1.25. 
LAKE    HOUSE.      From   the   German  of   Fanny    Lewald. 

1  vol.  16mo.     Cloth.     75  cents. 
LOWELL'S  (REV.  DR.  CHARLES)  PRACTICAL  SERMONS. 

1  vol.  12mo.  Cloth.  $1.25. 

"  "  OCCASIONAL  SERMONS. 

With    fine    Portrait.     1 

vol.  12mo.  Cloth.  $1.25. 

LIGHT  ON   THE  DARK  RIVER;  OR,  MEMOIRS  OF  MRS. 

HAMLIN.    1  vol.  16mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 
LONGFELLOW  (REV.  S.)  AND  JOHNSON  (REV.  S.)    A  book 

of   Hymns   for  Public    and  Private    Devotion.      6th  edition. 

75  cents. 
LABOR  AND  LOVE.     A  Tale  of  English  Life.    1  vol.  16ino. 

Cloth.     50  cents. 

LEE'S  (MRS.  E.  B.)   MEMOIR   OF  THE   BUCKMINSTERS. 

$1.25. 

"  "  FLORENCE,  THE  PARISH  ORPHAN. 

50  cents. 

"  "  PARTHENIA.     1  vol.  16mo.     $1.25. 

LUNT'S   (GEORGE)  THREE  ERAS  IN  THE  HISTORY  OF 

NEW  ENGLAND.    1  vol.    $1.00. 

MADEMOISELLE  MORI:  A  Tale  of  Modern  Rome.     1  vol. 
12mo.     Cloth.     $1.25. 

M^CLINTOCK'S  NARRATIVE   OF    THE  SEARCH  FOR   SIR 
JOHN  FKANKLIN.     With  Maps  and  Illustrations.    1  vol.    12mo. 
$1.00. 
MANN'S   (HORACE)    THOUGHTS    FOR   A    YOUNG   MAN. 

1  vol.    25  cents. 

"  "  SERMONS.  1  vol.  $1.00. 

MANN'S  (MRS.  HORACE)  PHYSIOLOGICAL  COOKERY-BOOK. 

1  vol.  16mo.     Cloth.    63  cents. 
"  "  THE    FLOWER    PEOPLE.      1   vol. 

Illustrated.     75  cents. 

MELVILLE'S  HOLMBY  HOUSE.  A  Novel.  8vo.  Paper.  50  cts. 

MITFORD'S    (Miss)   OUR   VILLAGE.    Illustrated.     2  vols. 

16mo.     $2.50. 

"  "        ATHERTON,   AND    OTHER    STORIES. 

1  vol.  16mo.     $1.25. 

MORLEY'S  LIFE  OF  PALISSY  THE  POTTER.    2  vols.  16mo. 

Clcth.     $1.50. 
MOUNTFORD'S  THORPE.     1  vol.     16mo.     Cloth.     $1.00. 


14       A  Lift  of  Books  Publifhed 


MOWATT'S  (ANNA  CORA)  AUTOBIOGRAPHY  OF  AN  Ac- 

TKESS.      $1.25. 

"  PLAYS.    ARMAND  AND  FASH 

ION.    50  cents. 

"  "  MIMIC  LIFE.     1  vol.    $1.25. 

"  "  THE  TWIN  ROSES.   1  vol.    75c. 

NORTON'S  (C.  E.)  TRAVEL  AND  STUDY  IN  ITALY.     1  vol. 

16mo.     Cloth.     $1.00. 

OVER  THE  CLIFFS.     By  Mrs.  Chanter.     1  vol.     $1.00. 
OTIS'S  (MRS.  H.  G.)  THE  BARCLAYS  OF  BOSTON.     1  vol. 

Cloth.     $1.25. 

PARSONS'S  (THEOPHILUS)  LIFE.  By  his  Son.  '  1  vol.  12rao. 
Cloth.  $1.50. 

PRESCOTT'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  ELECTRIC  TELEGRAPH. 
Illustrated.  1  vol.  12rao.  Cloth.  $1.75. 

POORE'S  (BEN  PERLEY)  Louis  PHILIPPE.     1  vol.    $1.00. 

PRIOR'S  LIFE  OF  EDMUND  BURKE.     2  vols.    16mo.    $2.00. 

RAB  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  By  John  Brown,  M.  D.  Illus 
trated.  15  cents. 

RAMSAY'S  REMINISCENCES  OF  SCOTTISH  LIFE  AND 
CHARACTER.  1  vol.  $1.00. 

SALA'S  JOURNEY  DUE  NORTH.    1  vol.  IGmo.  Cloth,  $1.00. 

SCOTT'S  (SiR  WALTER)  IVANHOE.  In  one  handsome  vol 
ume.  $1.75. 

SIDNEY'S  (SiR  PHILIP)  LIFE.  By  Mrs.  Davis.  1  vol. 
Cloth.  $1.25. 

SHELLEY  MEMORIALS.  Edited  by  the  Daughter-in-law 
of  the  Poet.  1  vol.  16mo.  75  cents. 

SWORD  AND  GOWN.  By  the  Author  of  "  Guy  Living 
stone."  1  vol.  IGmo.  Cloth.  75  cents. 

SHAKSPEAR'S  (CAPTAIN  H.)  WILD  SPORTS  OF  INDIA. 
1  vol.  IGmo.  Cloth.  75  cents. 

SEMI-DETACHED  HOUSE.     A  Novel.    1  vol.     75  cents. 

SMITH'S  (WILLIAM)  THORNDALE  ;  OR,  THE  CONFLICT 
OF  OPINIONS.  1  vol.  12mo.  Cloth.  $1.50. 

SUMNER'S  (CHARLES)  ORATIONS  AND  SPEECHES.    2  vols. 

IGmo.    Cloth.     $2.50. 

ST.  JOHN'S  (BAYLE)  VILLAGE  LIFE  IN  EGYPT.  2  vols.  IGmo. 

Cloth.     $1.25. 

TYNDALL'S  (PROFESSOR)  GLACIERS  OF  THE  ALPS.  With 
Illustrations.  1  vol.  Cloth.  $1  50. 

TYLL  OWLGLASS'S  ADVENTURES.  With  Illustrations  by 
Crowquill.  1  vol.  Cloth,  gilt.  $2.50. 

THE  SAND-HILLS  OF  JUTLAND.  By  Hans  Christian  An 
dersen.  1  vol.  IGmo.  90  cents. 

THE  SEVEN  LITTLE  SISTERS,  who  live  in  the  Round  Ball 
that  floats  in  the  Air.  Illustrated.  75  cents. 

THE  SOLITARY  OF  JUAN  FEKNANDEZ.  By  the  Author  of 
"  Ficciola."  1  vol.  16mo.  Cloth.  50  cents. 


by    TlCKNOR    AND    FlELDS.  15 


TRUE  WOMANHOOD.'    A  Novel.     By  John  Neal.    $1.25. 
TAYLOR'S  (HKNRY)  NOTES  FROM   LIFE.     1  vol.    16mo. 
Cloth.     63  cents. 

TRELAWNY'S  KKCOLLECTIONS  OF  SHELLEY  AND  BYRON. 

1  vol.  16mo.    Cloth.     75  cents. 

WARREN'S  (Dn.  JOHN   C.)  LIFE.     By  Edward  Warren, 

M.  I).    2  vols.  8vo.  $3.50. 

THE  PRESERVATION  OF  HEALTH. 

1  vol.    38  cents. 
WALLIS'S  (S.  T.)  SPAIN  AND  HER  INSTITUTIONS.     1  vol. 

6mo.     Cloth.    $1.00 
WILLIAMS'S  (Dii.  II.  W.)  DISEASES  OF  THE  EYE.     1  vol. 

$1.50. 

WORDSWORTH'S  (WILLIAM)  BIOGRAPHY.  By  Dr.  Chris 
topher  Wordsworth.  2  vols.  16mo.  Cloth.  $2.50. 

WENSLEY:  A  STORY  WITHOUT  A  MORAL.  1  vol.  16mo. 
Paper.  50  cents.  Cloth.  75  cents. 

WHEATON'S  (ROBERT)  MEMOIRS.  1  vol.  16mo.  Cloth. 
$1.00. 

In  Blue  and  Gold. 

LONGFELLOW'S  POETICAL  WORKS.    2  vols.    $2.00. 

"  PROSE  WORKS.     2  vols.    $2.00. 

TENNYSON'S  POETICAL  WORKS.     2  vols.    $2.00. 
WHITTIER'S  POETICAL  WORKS.     2  vols.    $2.00. 
LEIGH  HUNT'S  POETICAL  WORKS.     2  vols.    $2.00. 
GERALD  MASSEY'S  POETICAL  WORKS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 
MRS.  JAMESON'S  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  WOMEN.    $1.00. 

"  DIARY  OF  AN  ENNUYEE.    1  vol.   $1.00. 

"  LOVES  OF  THE  POETS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 

"  SKETCHES  OF  ART,  &c.     1  vol.     $1.00. 

"  STUDIES  AND  STORIES.     1  vol.     $1.00. 

"  ITALIAN  PAINTERS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 

"  LEGK.KDS  OF  THE  MADONNA.  1  vol.  $1.00. 

OWEN  MEREDITH'S  POEMS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 

"  LUCILE  :  A  Poem.     1  vol.     $1.00. 

BOWRING'S  MATINS  AND  VESPERS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 
LOWELL'S  (J.  RUSSELL)  POETICAL  WORKS.  2  vols.  $2.00. 
PERCIVAL'S  POETICAL  WORKS.     2  vols.    $2.00. 
MOTHERWELL'S  POEMS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 
SYDNEY  DOBELL'S  POEMS.     1  vol.     $1.00. 
WILLIAM  ALLINGHAM'S  POEMS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 
HORACE.     Translated  by  Theodore  Martin.     1  vol.    $1.00. 
SAXE'S  POETICAL  WORKS.    With  Portrait.     1  vol.    $1.00. 
CLOUGH'S  POETICAL  WORKS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 
HOLMES'  POETICAL  WORKS.     With  new  Portrait.     1  vol. 
$1.00. 

ADELAIDE  PROCTER'S  POEMS.     1  vol.    $1.00. 


16       A  Lift  of  Books  Publifhed. 


Works  Lately  Published. 

TITAN.     A  Romance.     By  Jean  Paul   Friedrich    Richter. 

Translated  by  Charles  T.  Brooks.    2  vols.     12mo.     $3.00. 
THE  STORY  OF  THE  GUARD.     A  Chronicle  of  the  War. 

By  Mrs.  Jessie  Benton  Fremont.   1  vol.  16mo.   Bevelled  boards, 

red  edges.     §1.25. 
A  PRESENT  HEAVEN.     By  the  Author  of  "  The  Patience 

of  Hope."    1  vol.    16mo.   '$1.00. 

BROADCAST.     By  Neherniah  Adams,  D.  D.     1vol.     $1.00. 
HANDBOOK  OF  UNIVERSAL  LITERATURE.     By  Mrs.  Anna 

C.  Lynch  Botta.    1  vol.    12mo.    $1.50. 

SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE'S  WRITINGS.  A  New  and  Elegant 
Edition,  comprising  "  Religio  Medici,"  "Urn-Burial,"  "Chris 
tian  Morals,"  £c.  With  fine  Portrait.  1  vol.  $1.50. 

SPARE  HOURS.     By  John  Brown,  M.  D.     1vol.    $1.50. 

MEMOIRS,  LETTERS  AND  REMAINS  OF  ALEXIS  DE 
TOCQUEVILLE,  Author  of  "Democracy  in  America."  2  vols. 
$2.50. 

MARGRET  HOWTH:   A  Story  of  To-Day .     1  vol.      16mo. 

90  cents. 
EYES  AND  EARS.   By  Henry  Ward  Beecher.    1  vol.    12rno. 

$1.50. 

COUNTRY  LIVING  AND  COUNTRY  THINKING.     By  Gail 

Hamilton.     1  vol.     16mo.     $1.50. 
THE  PATIENCE  OF  HOPE.     With  an  Introduction  by  John 

G.  Whittier.     1  vol.     16mo.     $1.00. 
THE   NEW   GYMNASTICS.     By  Dio  Lewis,  M.  D.     With 

300  Illustrations.     1  vol.     $1.25. 
THE  GOLDEN  HOUR.     By  M.  D.  Conway,  Author  of  "  The 

Rejected  Stone."     1  vol.     75  cents. 
SERMONS  Preached  in  Harvard  Chapel.    By  James  Walker, 

D.  D.     1  vol.    $1.50. 

THE  AUTOBIOGRAPHY,  LETTERS,  AND  LITERARY  RE 
MAINS  OF  MRS.  THKALE  PIOZZI.  Edited  by  A.  Hayward,  Esq. 
1  vol.  $1.50. 

THE  LIFE  AND  CAREER  OF  MAJOR  JOHN  ANDRE.     By 

Winthrop  Sargent.     1  vol.     $1.50. 

THE   RECREATIONS    OF   A    COUNTRY   PARSON.     2  vols. 

$1.50  each.     Sold  together  or  separately. 
LEISURE  HOURS  IN  TOWN.     By  the  "  Country  Parson." 

1  vol.     $1.50. 

GRAVER  THOUGHTS  OF  A  COUNTRY  PARSON.     By  the 

Author  of  "  Recreations,"  &c.     1  vol.     $1.50. 
PERSONAL   HISTORY  OF  LORD   BACON.    From  Original 

Letters  and  Documents.     By  Hepworth  Dixon.     1  vol.  $1.50. 
THE  AUTOBIOGRAPHY  OF  THE  REV.  DR.  ALEXANDER 

CAKLYLE.     Containing  Memorials  of  the  Men  and  P>ents  of 

his  Times.    Edited  by  John  Hill  Burton.    1  vol.    $1.50. 


n 


O 


s 


Om 
il 


16 


5 

m 


GENERAL  LIBRARY    U.C.  BERKELEY 


BODDS713b3 


JI/45T)/ 


Si 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


